


end of the world in hi definition

by origincptsuke (cptsuke)



Category: Original Work
Genre: Apocalypse, Gen, POV Second Person, not quite zombies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-07
Updated: 2019-07-07
Packaged: 2020-06-23 23:43:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 40,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19711909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cptsuke/pseuds/origincptsuke
Summary: The end of the world happens on a Tuesday.Well, it's been happening all last week too, but it's not like you ever really know that the ends coming until, you know, it's here. So Tuesday is when it happens for you.





	1. part 1 : end of the world in hi-definition (in your face and clear as day)

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this back in 2011 for my first nano, i didn't quite make the fiftythousand finish line but it was the most i had ever written back then and i was still quite pleased with the final product

The end of the world happens on a Tuesday.  
  
Well, it's been happening all last week too, but it's not like you ever really know that the ends coming until, you know, it's here. So Tuesday is when it happens for you. You've been in the United States for just over a month, backpacking and seeing sights and generally not having any responsibilities – which is a nice change from home. Soon you will have to go home, start university and start being that adult your parents always tell you you have to be.  
  
But for now you're enjoying New York City – sightseeing and kind of making a best friend. You don't know how that happened really. You've always been kind of a loner, your ex always said you had intimacy issues – and well, excuse fucking you, if you don't feel think _I’m bored_ is a great reason for sex – and you've always been shy. Except you share your room in the hostel with a tiny little Filipino American girl with the thickest southern accent you've ever heard outside of television, and she's friendly and, in between being an excellent travel buddy, she helps you navigate the bits of America that will probably always seem foreign to you.  
Maria came up here for a concert and decided to stay for a couple of weeks, just to look around.  
She gets phone calls from her dad every second day, demanding she come home, but she just shrugs.  
  
"I love my Dad, and I love working in the garage, but fuck it, I don't get the chance to travel a whole lot so I'mma have some fun while before I go back to being an adult."  
  
She likes muscle cars and foreign languages, is funny, bright and actually seems to like you. And, somehow, when you're around her, you're not that shy introverted person you normally are. Instead you go out, you talk to people, and you're learning to not be so down on yourself. You think that maybe Maria's the sort of friend you've always been looking for without even knowing it.  
  
On that Tuesday - the one where everything ends and it all begins - she receives a call from her father while the two of you are out shopping.  
It starts of normal, her smiling and talking about exploring, and visiting. But then her voice changes slightly and you look back her.  
  
"Daddy?" She asks, putting her finger in the opposite ear and leaning into her cell like she’s having trouble hearing.  
  
"Daddy, what's wrong?  
  
No, no, it's fine.  
  
I'm okay. Nothings wrong here.  
  
Is everything all right?  
  
No, no I'm coming back,  
  
yes; I'll just pack my stuff and be on the first-  
  
Train? Really? Okay, I'll catch a train back."  
  
She hangs up and stares at the phone for a moment.  
  
"Shitty fucking service today." Maria says with a frown.  
  
"Everything okay?" You ask because she looks strange.  
  
"Yeah, no, uh, I have to go home."  
  
"Okay."  
  
"Like right now."  
  
"Shit are you in trouble?"  
  
"No, it's just my Dad." She pauses, her frown coming back and that strange look on her face is starting to look a little like fear and worry. "He sounded really weird. Like he was scared."  
  
She laughs, scoffing at the idea.  
  
"And my Dad never gets scared. He gets angry. Really, _really_ angry, but not scared."  
  
"You gonna be okay?" You try to ask it carefully, not wanting to imply anything.  
  
"Yeah, I guess. It's just weird. He said to take a train home."  
  
"A train?"  
  
"Yeah, I know right? He said something about the planes stopping, and that it wasn't safe. I don't know, it doesn't make any sense. Planes don't just stop, that's really fucking weird, wouldn't we have heard something about that?"  
  
"Don't know, I guess?" You are starting to feel a little uneasy; your brain is starting to point out small facts that singularly are innocuous but together? Not so much.  
  
See the thing is, you haven't really noticed people getting sick or dropping out of existence. Maybe you've noticed a little, like peripherally, but you don't know any of these people, you've been living in a hostel with a transient population, it's not like a person not coming back the next day really registers as a bad thing. In fact it's only been the last couple of days that you've started feeling the change. You still can't put your finger on what exactly is wrong, but there’s a slight uneasiness that’s been sitting in your gut.  
  
Maybe you're just being silly.  
  
"Man, I'm holidays; I haven't seen the news in like forever. Maybe they've upped the terrorist threat level to whatever color stands for 'any day now'."  
  
"Yeah, I suppose. World's not supposed to end just because you stop watching the news." Maria says and you both laugh.  
  
"So what's the plan?"  
  
"Go back, get packed and head for the station, I guess."  
  
"Well all right then, let's go."  
  
"You coming?"  
  
"Hell yes," You answer enthusiastically as she protests.  
  
"You don't have to, there’s still plenty of time to shop and see stuff."  
  
"Meh," You say, shrugging. "They'll be there tomorrow. You, however, will not. And that is the saddest fucking thing in the world right now."  
  
Maria stops, like she's just realised the same thing.  
  
"Oh my god, shit, I am going to miss the fuck out of you."  
  
"I know, man, I can’t believe the first person I genuinely like is a southern hick." You joke.  
  
"Oh fuck you, foreigner!" She says laughing. Then stops and hugs you.  
  
"You can come visit me." You say, hugging back.  
  
"Ha-ha, 'cause Johannesburg is so fucking close. Oh this fucking sucks." She tightens her hug. "We are never going to see each other again."  
  
"No, shut up. Time to be optimistic. We are way too awesome to let Real Life get in the way of our awesomeness, our combined awesomeness."  
  
She sniffs, lets you go and nods.  
  
"Fuck it, when we get back to the hostel we'll exchange emails, addresses, phone numbers and any other thing we can think of."  


“Facebook me motherfucker.” You laugh, giving her a light punch on the shoulder.

  
The streets are strangely empty. That uneasiness stirs in your belly and you turn and whisper to Maria. Even though you don't know why you're whispering, it seems right.  
  
"Dude, I don't wanna be weird or anything, but is everything like super eerie and creepy? Like exceptionally eerie and creepy?"  
  
"It's not just me?" Maria asks, looking down the street, almost like she's expecting something terrible to come into view. "I swear to god those sirens haven't let up all day. And if I see another fucker trying to cough up a lung, I am going to throw up."  
  
"Do you think all this is, like, the swine flu or something?" Maybe that's what it is. Some sort of flu _thing_.  
  
"Maybe, I don't know. Whatever it is, lets get inside quickly."  
  
  
"You guys packing?" Carey sticks his head in the door and asks a stupid question. Which is Carey through and through. He's been staying in the room next door to you for longer than you've been here. Carey is tall, mostly skinny limbs and you've never seen him go anywhere without his laptop.  
  
"Yeah, gonna go home."  
  
"Hey, you guys hear about the Postal? It was like really close."  
  
"Postal?" Both you and Maria ask.  
  
"Yeah, Postal."  
  
You look at Maria.  
  
"That some sort of local slang I'm not getting?"  
  
She shakes her head then asks.  
  
"You mean some guy went postal?"  
  
He frowns.  
  
"No. Well yeah, but Postal, noun, not postal, verb. Although I guess he did go postal too."  
  
"What the fuck are you going on about?" Maria snaps.  
  
"A Postal." Carey enunciates. "Went, like, ape-shit, in a mall, like, a couple blocks from here. This shits at the front door."  
  
"What the fuck is Postal? That some sort of Canadian slang or something?"  
  
He frowns, looking from your face to Maria's like he's expecting one of you to say you're joking.  
  
"Do you guys really not get what's going on? Have you missed all the people getting sick, and all the radio warnings and, like, the disappearances and shit?"  
  
"What? Disappearances? Isn't the sick thing just like swine flu or something?"  
  
"Seriously? You guys are serious? Jesus Christ you girls been hiding under a rock or something?"  
  
"You gonna get with the explainy or keep being an asshole?"  
  
"Okay, Jesus," He sighs and actually looks worried. "I can't believe you guys have missed all the wack shit that’s been going on."  
  
"Are you going to tell us _anytime_ today?" You snap, the uneasiness you've been feeling slowly turning to something akin to panic.  
  
"Yeah, okay, Jesus, how to start? Well first people started getting sick. You seen that right?"  
  
Maria and you nod.  
  
"Well, what they've been keeping quiet is that, a lot of the guys who get infected, if they survive, wake up bat-shit insane. Like totally homicidal. At first everyone thought it was, like, random and shit. But, and this is actually quite funny, they realised they had a pattern on this guy, who just so happened to be a postman, and they figured out that the change was a side effect from surviving the infection. Basically Postman Pat gets sick and if he lives he goes postal.  
  
They thought maybe it had something to do with, like, low class people. You know, people more predispositioned to violence and stuff? But then there's this judge. She gets sick, wakes up and slaughters Mr Judge, her little kids and like half the fucking neighbourhood before disappearing. Shit's getting fucking wack, man."  
  
"How do you even know this shit?" Maria asks and you add.  
  
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure there'd be fucking panic on the streets if this was on the news."  
  
He shifts, eyes dropping to his fingers scratching at the door frame.  
  
"I like the internet okay? And I'm really good at playing with computers. So, you know, something catches my attention, it's really very easy to find out more shit. But it's all true. There is an infection. And it's not just here. It's happening all over the globe."  
  
You frown.  
  
"What about Africa?"  
  
"Africa? That bitch is going into meltdown."  
  
"What about South Africa?" You ask in a strangled voice. This morning you tried to call your parents, tell them you're having fun, you're fine, you'll be home soon, and the phone had just rung out. You figured they were just out, or busy, or any of the number of innocent reasons one can have for not answering the phone.  
  
"South Africa?" Carey runs his hands through his hair, oblivious to your inner meltdown. "Its still Africa, right? It's probably tearing itself apart too, right?"  
  
You feel sick and fumble for your cellphone. _No signal_. Fuck, you hear Maria snap _you jerk_ at Carey as you push past him and run down the hall to the public phones. Your fingers shake as you dial the numbers.  
  
_The number you are trying to reach is no longer available. Please check the number and dial again_.  
  
"No, no come on!" You hang up and try again. The same stupid calm voice informs you that nothing has changed. Only, everything has.  
  
"Are you okay?" Maria asks quietly.  
  
"No I am not fucking okay!" You yell. "I'm not okay, you're not okay, the whole world is very not o-fucking-kay at this point!"  
  
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry, oh god, I am sorry." She looks like she wants to cry and you calm down a little.  
  
"No, I'm sorry." You sigh and hang up the phone. "It's just, this is fucking insane, you know?"  
  
"Yeah. Like insane crazy and what the ever loving fuck?"  
  
You both laugh even though neither of you are amused.  
  
"Fuck, let's just retire that question completely."  
  
"Yeah, let's do that."  
  
"What are we gonna do?"  
  
Maria goes back to your room and wheels her suitcase out.  
  
"Well, I’m going home, and I gotta say, I think you should come with. If this is all true, staying in the city seems silly."  
  
You nod, if it's all as bad as drama!boy is saying, maybe you should leave.  
  
Someone shouts from the recreation room.  
  
"What's going on?" Maria asks a guy near the door.  
  
"Quick, come look at this." He says without looking away from the television.  
  
The television is turned up loud in the rec room. The anchorwoman looks scared and nervous.  
  
"Way to not inspire confidence, lady." Maria mumbles and is promptly shushed by pretty much everyone in the room.  
  
"I repeat, we are advising people to stay in their homes. To stay away from the infected, as they are considered extremely contagious. If you are confronted by a Postal, please do not attempt to interact with them." A banner reading _Breaking News: Now in Hi-Definition_ scroll across the screen and you lean over and whisper to Carey.  
  
"Is it bad that my first thought is 'wow that picture is so clear'?" Carey snickers and the anchorwoman starts talking again.  
  
"We have an update on the situation. We're receiving word that the Postal's have taken over West Point Military Academy. Civilians are being advised to avoid the area."  
  
She puts her hand to her ear, face paling noticeably.  
  
"Civilians are now being advised to evacuate the city. Postals have taken the 105th precinct in Queens. People are being advised to avoid the area and avoid all contact with the Postals. We are being advised on evacuation routes and procedures, please stand by."  
  
"Shit. This is happening quick." Maria mutters in your ear.  
  
"I know, Jesus, this is crazy. You still going?"  
  
"Got to try. We're supposed to evacuate right?"  
  
You chew on your bottom lip, you've never felt so indecisive in all your life.  
  
"Guess it's as good an idea as any we have."  
  
"Why am I coming again?" Carey complains, staring back the hostel's front door.  
  
"Because you're the one that started with the scaring. Now you get to be chaperone."  
  
"Can't I just say sorry and go back to my room?"  
  
"You try it and I will punch you in the nose. Here, carry this." You shove Maria's backpack into his arms.  
  
"Admit it, you just wanted a packhorse." Carey whines as Maria's cellphone starts ringing.  
  
"What I don't get is why you're still in the city if you knew all this was happening." You ask while Maria talks quietly on the phone.  
  
"Come on, this is the best place for me, with my knowledge of what's going on and stuff. I can help!" He puffs out his chest and you laugh.  
  
Its a welcome change distraction from reality, all you want to do is curl up in bed and never leave it. Now you've got a reason for feeling so freaked out, all the streets seem to empty and every so often a scream echoes down the streets.  
  
"Jeesus." You breathe the word out.  
  
"Daddy?" Maria's voice is suddenly loud. "Dad, I'm okay, I'm coming home, going to the train now. what do you mean? I don't understand. Daddy? How will you find me? Dad? Dad? Fuck! Fucking phone! Shit!" She screeches and looks up at them, eyes reddening. All you want to do is ask if she's okay.  
  
"We aren't going to the station." Maria says.  
  
"What'd he say?" Carey asks quietly, trying not to push the issue, even though you can see he's hella curious.  
  
"Said Birmingham wasn't safe." Maria speaks in a quiet, subdued voice. "Said to stay here. Said he'd come up here."  
  
"What the fuck are we gonna do?" Carey asks, panicking as Maria glares at her signalless phone. You breathe in deep. This might be one of those moments that ends up being really important.  
  
"Carey. How dangerous is it? Like, right now?" You ask, speaking hard but calmly.  
He gulps.  
  
"I don't know, I guess it's okay? As long as we don't run into any of _them_."  
  
"Okay, then let's hole up in the hostel. Just get supplies and lay low, no one needs to know we're there."  
  
You watch them thinking about it. It sounds like a good idea. You hope it's a good idea.  
  
"Okay." Carey says while Maria nods and adds.  
  
"We'll need something to protect ourselves. Guns, or something. A gun probably."  
  
Carey giggles nervously, then grins.  
  
"Where can we get guns?" You ask, because, really, where the hell do you get guns from?  
  
"Uhh, a gunshop?" Carey mocks. "There's actually one quite close, if that's what we're gonna do."  
  
That decided, Maria takes her luggage back to the hostel, when you walk out this time Tom the manager yells out.  
  
"Be careful out there!"  
  
"We'll be right back!" Carey calls back and the manager looks sceptical.  
  
"Are we being really stupid?" You ask as you walk down the street, you can't help but think if all this goes horribly wrong, it's going to be mostly your fault.  
  
In the streets now, it's glaringly obvious that things have gone seriously wrong. The smell of smoke hangs in the air and the sirens seem to have almost completely stopped. Every now and then a lone siren wails like a child bereft of everything. It's possibly the creepiest noise you've ever heard.  
  
A hundred metres from the gunshop and all hell breaks loose.  
  
You throws yourself down, followed quickly by the other two, and they scuttle across the pavement to the nearest alley. Gunfire fills the air and its _loud_.  
  
Windows shatter across the street as you peek around the edge of the brickwork. Smoke is billowing out of the shop front, and you can see muzzle flashes lighting up in the haze. You duck back behind the bricks.  
  
"Let's not go there." You say around a silly grin, it's not funny and you're scared as hell, but you can't help but grin as your heart seems to threaten to explode it's going so fast. Maria lets out a nervous giggle and Carey gives a faint smile as you back track, taking the next street back - getting the fuck off the gunshop's street.  
  
"Do we go back?" Maria asks, looking like they've failed before they even started.  
  
"I don't know," You says, maybe your idea was stupid, maybe they should be trying to get out of town. How come in movies when people have ideas they follow it through? You've had an idea for less than half and hour and you're already doubting it's merits.  
  
As you walk past Wal-mart, the sliding glass doors open and everyone freaks the fuck out.  
You look at your companions and don't feel any less silly for your pose of surprise even though they are frozen in similar ones.  
  
"Wal-mart has guns." Maria says, a grin forming on her face.  
  
You do a quick run around the ship, trying to see if anyone else was in there. It's a nervous thing, walking down aisles and just waiting for someone to jump out and attack you.  
  
But shopping.  
  
That's kind of a fantasy come true, shopping without price limit or rules.  
  
You find the gun cabinet; it's a weldmesh cage, chained and padlocked shut.  
  
"It's locked!" You yell, rattling at the cage.  
  
"Wait up a minute!" Carey yells, ducking down an aisle.  
  
You wait.  
  
"God bless Wal-Mart!" Carey proclaims as he comes back with boltcutters.  
  
You heft the first rifle over the counter.  
  
"You all know how to use these?"  
  
Maria raises an eyebrow as she reaches for it.  
  
"Bitch please, I'm from Alabama." She laughs and starts hunting around for the ammunition cage.  
  
"Carey, what do you want?"  
  
"Uh," You look up and he's biting his lip. "I'm Canadian, I'm a pacifist."  
  
Maria looks like she wants to turn the rifle on him. You open your mouth to say _it's the end of the world, bitch, and you are going to fucking kill something_ and his serious face drops and he breaks into laughter.  
  
"Dude, I'm just fucking with you! They gotta twelve gauge?"  
  
You hears the sound of footsteps scraping on the floor behind you and as one they all spin and point their newly pilfered guns. A guy stands in the aisle, in a wal-mart uniform with a Hi My Name Is Gary badge and a pistol pointing at you. He looks about about as surprised to find them as they are to see him.  
  
You think about pulling the trigger, part of your mind whispers that the guy's gun is pointing at Carey, you'd most likely be fine if you did pull the trigger. That thought almost scares you more than this whole situation.  
  
The guy coughs and Carey twitches noticeably; it won't be long before someone starts shooting. You wonder if it'll be you.  
But Maria surprises everyone by lowering her rifle.  
  
"Hey, it's okay." She says evenly. "We're just passing through. Only taking what we need to evacuate."  
  
She lies with such a steady calming voice. You kind of wonder why all negotiators didn't have southern accents. Much more of this and _you'll_ be putting down _your_ gun.  
  
"We'll go now, we're very sorry we bothered you."  
  
"But you're still taking everything?" He asks with a laugh of disbelief.  
  
"Yes we are." The soothing quality drains from her voice. "You know how dangerous it is out there. You want us to leave without supplies? Shit, we might as well shoot it out now. I guarantee we'll win."  
  
He bares his teeth in a mockery of a grin, then nods.  
  
"Okay, okay. You'll probably need it if you're gonna try to evacuate."  
  
That just sounds ominous. You gesture with your gun, following his every movement with it has left a deep ache in your arms. The gun shakes slightly and all you wants to do is put it down; fear and adrenaline the only things keeping it horizontal.  
  
"What do you mean?"  
  
"You haven't heard? Just wait," He lifts a finger - _just wait, I'm not trying anything_ \- and slowly backs down towards the electronics section.  
  
"You guys should probably take a radio too." He says as he fiddles with the dial. A voice, soft and of indeterminable gender, filters through the static.  
  
"..advising civilians to stay away from Staten Island, it's presumed taken by these people. Grand Central Station is burning, strike that off your evacuation plans. No one's been able to get close to the airport, so we're presuming that's in their possession too. You're listening to The Radio, giving you information that everyone else is either too stupid to know or just don't want you to know. Some National Guardsmen headed that way a couple of hours ago, but we haven't heard anything else from them since then so..."  
  
He turns the volume down.  
  
"It's just more of the same," He says. "I don't think it's an official broadcasting, but it's the one with the best information. Apparently all the evacuation plans are fucked up, pretty much every road's jammed up. And Postals are like killing anyone they find."  
  
He sighs running his hand through his hair.  
  
"I don't even get what's happening. I mean, Postals? What the fuck is that, even?"  
  
"What about the government. Like the army and stuff?" Maria asks.  
  
The guy shrugs.  
  
"Half of them probably turned. I think it's fair to say we're on our own."  
  
"Shit." Carey says, like for all his information he's only just now getting how fucked up everything is.  
  
Gary gives a lopsided grin.  
  
Strangely enough, he seems quite accommodating after that. Gives you batteries, a radio, makes sure they get water, _because the power's not gonna last for long_.  
  
"Thank you." Maria says, somehow she's become the groups voice.  
  
He shrugs, looking at his ratty sneakers.  
  
"I think we're all screwed, but we gotta do something, right? Not much point in just sitting down and dying."  
  
He has a point.  
  
  
When they get back to the hotel, it's nearly completely empty. Tom eyes their rifles and bags then shrugs.  
  
"Figured you'd evacuated with everyone else."  
  
"Doesn't sound like a great idea." Carey says, hefting the radio into view. "Turns out this shit is getting real bad, real quick."  
  
There's only six of them remaining in the three story hostel. Shannon, Carey, Maria, Tom the manager - who acts like the world hasn't ended, Dave the Aussie - who seems to be planning on spending the end of the world drunk, and a Swedish girl - who doesn't speak English and seems to have pilfered a handgun from somewhere.  
  
The radio transmissions get more and more bleak. Postals seem to be taking land, pushing outwards and killing anyone not infected. The government seems to have toppled completely. You can't really muster up any care about that, but Maria says that _you get used to a bunch of old guys being in charge_.  
  
The weirdest thing is the movement happening down south. At first the radio says they're Postals. But eventually the voice says that they're just people. Creating some sort of separatist movement called the Allied States of America.  
  
_Here to remake America and right her wrongs_.  
  
There's another separatist movement happening in the heartlands, those ones call themselves the Confederates, and seem to be spouting the same sort of shit.  
  
The power goes off but nothing really changes. Sweden - the pretty Swedish girl with long blonde hair and a model's figure - leaves everyone alone, wandering in and out of the hostel and bringing back random supplies.  
  
Aussie Dave mopes in his room, getting weird and bitter as more time goes by and nothing gets better.  
  
Maria goes down, sick. She stares at you with wide scared eyes and you don't know what to do.  
  
"I don't want to become one of them."  
  
"We don't know that will happen." You say stubbornly, as Dave eyes them both.  
  
"But-"  
  
"You heard the radio, they don't know everything yet. Some people survive." You cut her off. Because it's true. "Hell, they say that Postals even calm down after the first couple of weeks."  
  
"They also said they don't get any less homicidal." Maria says angrily, with glassy eyes. "It just means they're better at hiding what they are. So when you're not looking they'll kill you in a nice calm way."  
  
"You won't change." You repeat, even though you knows you're probably lying.  
  
"I will, and when I do you're gonna have to put me down."  
  
"What?"  
  
"You heard me." Maria forms her hand into the shape of a gun and puts it to her temple. "Bang, bang."  
  
"I can't do that."  
  
"I'll do it then." Maria makes to get up, and you hold out her hands.  
  
"No! No, stop! Okay!" You sigh and wonder how the hell you got here. "Okay, I'll do it."  
  
"You will?"  
  
"You wake up trying to kill me, I'll, you know, do it."  
  
Maria smiles a tired smile, eyes slipping closed.  
  
"You know that's good, because I don't think I can stand up anymore."  
  
  
You argued with Dave not long after that.  
  
Him yelling. "She's sick, she's gonna turn into one of them!"  
  
And you yelling back, "We don't know that!"  
  
"We do!"  
  
"You even think about it and I'll fucking kill you!"  
  
"That's great, threaten to kill the voice of reason!"  
  
"You're not the voice of fucking reason! Carey, back me up here."  
  
"I don't know. I, I just don't know okay?"  
  
"This isn't up for fucking debate."  
  
Eventually you'd both agreed to disagree and stormed off in opposite directions.  
  
Less than three hours later Carey stumbles in, skin hot to the touch.  
  
"I don't want to die."  
  
"I am not having this conversation again." You say, holding up a hand when he tries to speak again. Instead you lead him into the room you've designated as the sickroom.  
  
"I don't feel good." Carey says as he curls up on the bed.  
  
"It's alright, if you wake up not yourself, I'll kill you."  
  
"..I don't think I want you to kill me."  
  
"Too bad, I'm doing a two for one deal." You say airily and leaves him to sleep. You wonder if you could actually do it. Pull the trigger on someone. It's the end of the world and you haven't come up against anything yet. The Radio says there's looters all over, and Postals, and just _people_ trying to grab what's left.  
  
But this neighbourhood is quiet. You hope that means everyone tried to evacuate and not that you're sitting in the middle of Postal territory, waiting to be discovered and killed without knowing it.  
  
That would suck a whole lot. You're finding it harder and harder to venture outside, the only time you do, is at night, and only for small trips. Gary's Wal-Mart is completely empty, You hope that means he left, but there's a suspicious smell coming from behind the locked back rooms and, well, you're not stupid enough to go looking for a body.  
  
  
So you spends your days sitting at the window - gun beside you - seated far enough back in the shadows that if anyone were to glance up they wouldn't see you.  
  
Sometimes you see people. Some running. Some walking. You're pretty sure you even see a Postal. You don't know why you're so sure he is one, but the hairs on the back of your neck stand up when you sees him and you would swear on a stack of bibles that the seemingly harmless man strolling down the street of one of _them_.  
  
You watch your two friends sleep fitfully and listens to The Radio. Someone's still spreading the news. You think maybe you're a little in love with the soft voice coming from the speakers.  
  
Apart from Dave the Aussie's sullen glares; he's not particularly happy about living in a place where there are infected and if you walk out the sickroom door to see him standing at the end of the hall with a gun again you're going to shoot him in the kneecaps. He scares the fuck out of you.  
  
And Sweden's quiet, no English and her disappearing for hours on end and when she does come in she wears a gasmask - although where the hell she got it from, you don't know - and you don't know whether to be amused or offended.  
  
A day later she gives you a little white face mask and smiles like she's given you a million dollars. It probably won't save you but wearing it makes you feel like a bank robber so you keep it, even if you do let it hang around your neck most of the time.  
  
The Radio is your only source of human contact and information.  
  
You're learning about the Great American Revolution Take Two. Learning about Postals, and the infection and how out of those that get sick the smallest most minuscule percentage can survive without going batshit homicidal crazy.  
  
That gives you hope even when Tom sticks his head in the door, ruffles her hair, and says he feels like his coming down with something, is locking himself in his apartments and don't try to come in.  
  
You learn you really hate sudoku.  
  
  
You sleep lightly these days; you don't like the look on Dave's face every time he looks at the sickroom's door. It's an odd expression, one that makes you uneasy and keeps you awake long into the night, holding your shotgun with white knuckled grip.  
  
When you do sleep, you dream. Dreams about dark shadows that grab at your face, squeezing your jaw and trying to make you stare in it's eyes. You wake up with an aching jaw, muttering _not today, not today_ over and over again.  
  
You wonder if you're cracking under the stress.  
  
The second day you wake from those dreams, you've got small bruises dotted around your jaw, like someone had gripped it really tight. You dismiss it as chance and happenstance. But still, a week late the bruises haven't dulled; now they just look like permanent grease smudges along your jawline.  
  
It's weird and a little unsettling, but in the grand scheme of _things_ , you're more worried about Dave that the minor weirdness of some randomly placed bruises.  
  
You don't know why or how you wakes the moment before Dave walks into the room. One moment you're blinking, barely awake, the next the door is flung open with a loud band and suddenly your shotgun is in your hands, pointing at his chest.  
  
He stands there with his gun in hand, nostrils flaring.  
  
Later you'll tell yourself that it was instinct, some sort of half-asleep, unconscious fight - or - flight reaction. All you know is that you don't hesitate to pull the trigger.  
  
The noise is fucking _loud_ , the shotgun's kickback punches into your shoulder and you see the gun in Dave's hand flashes fire.  
  
The wall behind you showers plaster over everything and Dave falls backwards with a grunt. He blinks, once, twice, at you as you toe the gun away from his hand.  
  
You looks back at the beds, none of them had stirred - _they sleep like the dead_ \- and you shudders at the thought.  
  
Taking a deep breath you force yourself to look at Dave the Aussie. His chest is pretty much obliterated; you can see bits of white bone, muscle and blood. A lot of blood.  
  
"I'm sorry." You whisper as he makes choking noises. "I'm sorry."  
  
You kneel down beside him and hold his hand as tight as you can. The grip back is nigh non existent.  
  
It doesn't take long, even though it seems like years sitting on the floor watching the poor guy slowly choke and die. You're still sitting there when Sweden sticks her head in the doorway and blinks.  
  
"Herregud!”  
  
You wonder if Sweden will kill you now; you wonder of you'll even care.  
  
Instead she holds up a finger and disappears down the hall. She comes back with a shower curtain.  
  
"Vi kommer att täcka honom och ta honom bort ."  
  
It takes a moment for you to get what she's doing. You pry your hand from the dead man's grip and help Sweden roll him in the stiff plastic.  
  
"You're very practical, Sweden." You say because doing this in silence was maybe weirder.  
  
Manhandling a plastic wrapped body to stairs is not what you thought you'd be doing on your holiday.  
  
"han har tittat på mig konstigt, det skrämde mig." She says as she shoves the wrapped body down the first run of stairs.  
  
It's juvenile. It's silly. It's a little sick. But getting the body down the stairs is kind of hilarious. You find yourself giggling, and it doesn’t take long for Sweden to join in, as you both shift the body around the banister and let it fall down the next flight of stairs. You know its the kind of laughter that could quickly turn into sobbing, but you can't help it.  
  
"Where do you even dump a body?" You ask when the body _thunks_ on the ground floor.  
  
Sweden doesn't say anything, just goes to the front door, unlocks it, and pulls out her pistol.  
  
You watch her, half amused, half amazed. Sweden slowly opens the door and does what looks like a very professional move, sweeping the street for signs of life. She looks back at you and gives a short nod.  
  
"Redo?"  
  
"Jeee-sus." You breath the word out longer than necessary.  
  
"I ALWAYS LIKED SPY MOVIES. LIKE JAMES BOND." She says with a shy smile.  
  
"James Bond?" You wonder if Sweden is saying that she _is_ James Bond, or if she just wants to be. Either way, she kind of rocks at it.  
  
"Okay, where do we take this?"  
  
"Flod."  
  
"Eh?" This conversing with someone you don't understand is difficult.  
  
"Flod." She pauses, as if thinking about a way to get her point across. "Hudson."  
  
"Oh! The river."  
  
"Ja, river. Det finns förmodligen många kroppar i den."  
  
"There's probably a heap in there already anyway."  
  
It's awkward, toting a body between you and trying to keep your guns up. Every noise has you both dropping the body - it hits the pavement with the sound of bones cracking - and scanning the streets. You try very hard to keep quiet and unnoticed.  
  
But suddenly a man comes around the corner and shout in surprise.  
  
"Back off!" He yells as you drop the body and point your weapons.  
  
"Don't shoot! Its okay!" You yell as Sweden growls something that sounds angry. "We aren't Postals! We aren't even sick!"  
  
"What's wrong with her?" He snarls, gesturing with his pistol at Sweden.  
  
"Nothing! She's Swedish, she doesn't speak any English!"  
  
"Sorry," He says lowering his gun slightly.  
  
"No it's okay," You grin. "We got our guns pointed at you too."  
  
"Can't be too careful." He says, grinning back. "That a body?"  
  
"Could be." You don't know why you’re being so cheeky; maybe its the fact that you're having a conversation at gunpoint and aren't even scared, maybe it's relief from seeing someone not infected on the streets.  
  
A dark shadow seems to flicker behind the man and you frown. It's broad daylight and there's no way there'd be a shadow there. You blink, perhaps you've something in your eyes.  
  
"Did you hear that?" The guy asks, turning to look down the cross street he's standing on.  
  
The noise of gunfire is sudden and loud.  
  
Sweden snaps _SKIT_ _!_ and crouches low. You freeze, watching as bullets tear apart the man's chest.  
  
"Is that?" You ask, not knowing what to ask.  
  
All these days and you still haven't run into a Postal.  
  
Until now.  
  
It's a man, carrying some sort of automatic gun and he looks pissed. He stands over the guy he's just shot, the look on his face is all rage and anger. He stares at the guy, those emotions never wavering, then raises his gun and pumps a few dozen more rounds into the guy's chest.  
  
Without thinking, you duck and roll for the nearest alley. The noise of you moving alerts the Postal and he swings his gun in your direction. Sweden just crouches lower and starts firing, even as the man - _the Postal_ \- fires back.  
  
You watch, amazed, as every one of Sweden's shots hit him. He still looks so angry, even as those bullets hit him centre-mass, even as he falls to the ground.  
  
Silence falls over the streets and you peer over; the Postal is writhing on the ground with Sweden standing over him. She kicks his little compact automatic away in a decidedly dainty manner then lines her pistol up to his head.  
  
_click_  
  
She frowns at her gun.  
  
_click_  
  
Then she starts swearing. You can't help the small, nervous grin that crosses your face. You don't know what Sweden's saying, but cursing as pretty much the same cadence and feel to it, no matter what the language.  
  
The Postal starts laughing - a choking, wet sound - and you walk up, hands aching you've got such a tight grip on your shotgun. He laughs even harder when he sees you. His eyes are bright and filled with hate and pain, but he laughs at you like you're the most pathetic thing in the world. Sweden gestures for the gun.  
  
"Låt mig göra det."  
  
And you look at the man that the Postal killed. He might've been an ally, he seemed nice. He hadn't shot them even though he had definitely had the chance, and really hadn't any reason not to.  
  
The you look at the Postal - _face to face with the enemy_ \- you guess. And that enemy thinks you're weak; thought you don't have what it took to survive. You are going to disabuse him of the idea.  
  
You line up your gun and for a moment it seems like his shadow flickers.  
  
"Not today." You say the words quietly, but firmly.

_Not today_.  
  
After, he doesn't look evil. He just looks like a guy you shot in the face with a shotgun.  
  
"Fuuuck." You breathe through clenched teeth. "I wish it was Zombies. Is it bad that I'm wishing for zombies?"  
  
"Zombies?" Sweden smiles and gives you the thumbs up. "Zombies!"  
  
It seems that zombies are a universal language breaker. Good to know.  
  
Sweden laughs, like everything she does, it's dainty and pretty. Then she holds out her hand.  
  
"Ellena.,mitt namn är Ellena."  
  
"Shannon." You grasp her hand and shake it. "Ellena, are you aware that you are completely bad ass?"  
  
"Bad ass?" You're confusing her but you continue onwards.  
  
"James Bond bad ass." You clarify in a way that's probably even more vague, picking up the Postal's gun and holding up in the sunlight. It looks like one of those MAC-10's they use in all the movies. Sweet.  
  
"Det var väldigt högt. Vi borde gå." Ellena says gesturing at her ears as she picks up the downed man's pistol.  
  
"Noisy, yeah? We should probably move on quick like, I guess. In case one of these guys has friends. Do Postals travel in packs?" You wonder out aloud as you tuck the gun into your waistband. It's cold and hard and digs into uncomfortably into your hip. You can't help but think it's going to go off; and how embarrassing will it be to die from getting shot _there_? How do gangbangers and pimps do this anyhow?  
  
"Vad vi gör med kroppen?" Ellena asks, looking pointedly at shower curtain wrapped Dave. You both stare at it silent, and you think that the festively bright fish and seahorses might actually be the most disturbing thing you've ever seen.  
  
"Fuck it," You say as Ellena says.  
  
"Nu går vi hem."  
  
"Sorry Dave." You say, and are a little surprised to realise that you actually mean it. You can't really blame him for what happened. If Maria and Carey weren't your friends, well, who knows how you would've reacted.  
  
  
The hostel looks no different from when you left it. You don't know what you were expecting, maybe some sort of darkness and evil hanging over the place. But it's still the same bright welcoming place it was the first day you stayed there.  
  
None of the sick have woken, or even stirred and you don't know if that's a good sign or not.  
  
_Of those infected, fifty per cent die._  
  
That's not good odds. Especially when you factor in that of the remaining percentage, only five per cent - if that - wake up not Postal.  
  
There's not a lot you can do for them; so you resume your vigil, hoping that they're lucky and listening to the radio cradled in your lap.  
  
The voice on it is sounding less and less like The Radio - Edgy Freedom Fighter - and more and more like a scare kid whose backed themselves into a corner and has no other option but to continue the way they're going. You think you might like this version better than the other. It's a lot less reassuring, but it's a hell of a lot easier to relate to.  
  
Despite The Radio's dwindling optimism, he now fully supports evacuating the city. He says that New York is nearly completely taken and that you're more likely to be found by Postals long before there's even a glimmer of a chance of the city being retaken. Postals are hunting the survivors, going street by street, block by block, removing anyone they find the only way they care to.  
  
The Radio says there's a border to the west - no clue as to how far west it actually is - but the Uniteds made a stand and managed to not be pushed back by the oncoming Postals. You don't like the term 'border', it sounds too much like giving up and settling to have homicidal maniacs as neighbours.  
  
But still, the idea of safe land is appealing as fuck. The Radio says there's another border to the south, held by the Feds, but it falls and stands on a day by day basis. And there's less in house fighting between the factions when they've got a common enemy massed in one place.  
  
It's kind of amazing. A war has been going on while you locked yourself in this place, and you can't decide if you're really glad or annoyed to be missing it. There's a part of you, one that you're not sure existed before now, a part that remembers the kick of the shotgun against your shoulder and the speckling of hot blood and how _good_ it felt to take down a Postal.  
  
That part of you wants the chance to do it again.  
  
Even ignoring that voice, you still think trying to make the border is probably a good idea. There are thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of Postals in the city. And a good many are dedicating their every hour to searching the city, and cleansing it of any survivors.  
  
Using a Swedish To English phrasebook that's mostly in Swedish, and what is probably the most important game of charades in your life, you discuss with Ellena the possibility of trying to find the west border. She seems to think its a good idea. Well, she gives you the thumbs up, so she definitely approves of something. You just hope its 'let's get the fuck out of dodge' and not 'let's go kamikaze on these Postal fuckers'.  
  
Not that the idea hasn't crossed your mind. You kind of wonder how many you could take out. You bet Ellena would kick ass at it; James Bond bad ass that she is. Sometimes you have grand daydreams of fighting your way over to where ever The Radio is holed up and saving the day.  
  
On the other hand, you want to live.  
  
You really _really_ want to live.  
  
Maybe even forever.  
  
But first Maria and Carey have to wake up. You wonder how long Ellena is going to stay around; she comes in - still wearing her gas mask - and you can almost see her trying to work out how to say 'we should leave them'. You don't know how you would disagree if she ever finds the words.  
  
Instead you ignore that elephant in the room and spread a map across the hallway floor. Slowly plotting out on the map all the little information the two of you have. There's a border to the west, somewhere between Newark and Pennsylvania. And there's a shaky one to the south.  
  
Somewhere.  
  
You're pretty sure there's some people a block or two from Gary's Wal-Mart, but you're not sure if they're friendly or not. Ellena draws frowny faces over random blocks. You wish it meant they were shitty shops and not people that wanted to kill you.  
  
Shit there's a lot of them.  
  
You glance sideways at Ellena, she's done a lot of travelling around if the spread out frowny faces are anything to go by.  
  
"West?" Ellena asks, pointing at the border with the Uniteds.  
  
"We'll need supplies." You say nodding, it seems like the best choice out of a series of shitty ones.  
  
She says something that goes completely over your head and stands up.  
  
"Tom." She says.  
  
"Uhh?" You eloquently reply.  
  
"Tom car."  
  
"Oh, for the supplies?"  
  
"Ja."  
  
"Do you think it's safe?" You're not sure if you're referring to driving a car or to going into Tom's apartment. She shrugs.  
  
"Vad mer kan vi göra ?"  
  
  
  
Tom's apartment is on the ground floor; it's front door opens into the hostel's lobby. And it feels fucking dark and ominous as you descend the stairs. You can't explain why, but you're suddenly sure this is a terrible idea.  
  
"Maybe we shouldn't do this." You say, hanging back at the reception desk.  
  
"Tom?"  
  
"He did say leave him be."  
  
"Tom? det mig Ellena. Tom?  
  
**BANG! BANG! BANG!**  
  
_holy fucking shit._  
  
Ellena stumbles back - her legs giving way - twisting at she crumples to the ground. Her mouth soundlessly tries to form words that you wouldn't be able to understand even if you could hear them. She looks at you with wide eyes, looking about as surprised as you feel.  
  
You were fucking _certain_ that Ellena would survive all this; she's so _capable_ and fucking bad ass.  
You stand up from behind the desk where you'd automatically hid and bring your shotgun up to your shoulder. You suppose you should be glad you've taken to carrying it with you where ever you go but it doesn't really feel like a step forward in a good direction. Staying very still you look through the bullet holes in the door and wait until you see movement.  
  
You put the first round through the door at head height; then without pause, rack up another shell and fire, once, twice, three times at chest height. You walk forward as you fire again and again, this time at stomach level.  
  
You almost don't feel the kick of each shot; you're concentrating so hard on what's beyond the door. By the time you reach the door it's a splintered mess; woodchips and debris covering everything. You're so occupied with watching for movement that you almost trip over Ellena.  
  
"Sorry." You whisper.  
  
And it's sorry I just kicked you.  
  
Sorry you got shot.  
  
Sorry I didn't go first.  
  
Sorry I'm no good at this.  
  
Just _sorry_.  
  
But from here you can see it's too late for her to hear you and, well, you're sorry for that as well.  
  
Through the door you think you see a shadow, or maybe some movement and you pull the trigger again.  
  
_click_  
  
Fuck. Throwing yourself against the wall next to the door, you fumble for spare shells and you think this is fucking it, you're a sitting duck here.  
  
_Jesus_ , you're going to have to learn to count these fucking things while you're firing, especially if you don't want to die in a spectacularly stupid manner and you actually want to live. This is just ridiculous.  
  
You try to calm your breathing - all the panting and shaking is going to fuck up your aim - then count slowly -  
  
_one.  
  
two.  
  
__**three**_  
  
\- and slam the shotgun's butt into the wood just above the door knob. It swings violently open in a way that suggests it's about to fall off its hinges. But nothing else moves.  
  
_one.  
  
two.  
  
__**three**_.  
  
You spin around, through the door, trying to keep the gun aimed where you're looking as you scan the room. Any moment now, you think, any moment now you're going to be shot and this'll all be over.  
  
Tom has a thirty-eight revolver, you remember; you don't know if that's a big gun or not, but you've seen the mess it made of both the door and Ellena and you think. _Shit, I am going to fucking die._  
  
You have to go past a couch to get to the next room and your brain unhelpfully supplies you with the idea that maybe Tom's hiding behind it, just waiting for you to innocently walk past. You've seen enough dead bodies now, it isn't hard for you to come up with imagery in technicolor of what you getting gutshot will look like. You're practically curling up in anticipation already.  
  
With those lovely thoughts you round the two seater gingerly and discover that Tom is indeed behind the couch. You almost shoot him in surprise.  
  
Only he's flat on his back, dead eyes staring up at nothing and blood seeping into the shag carpet. You think if you go through the rest of your life without seeing a body fucked up by a shotgun, you could probably be very happy.  
  
"Sorry, Tom." You say as you stand over his corpse. You don't feel all that apologetic, truth be told.  
  
You pick up his revolver, there's two shot still left and, as you tuck it into your jeans, you wonder if Tom keeps spare ammunition.  
  
Ellena is still where she fell, she looks strangely peaceful compare to every other dead perosn you've seen this month. Her eyes are almost close and a small trail of blood runs from her mouth down her chin and neck.  
  
"Sorry." You say as you kneel down beside her and pry her gun from her hand. You don't know why you always feel the need to apologise to the dead. It's not like they really care either way.


	2. part II (get out of new york)

You give them shallow graves in the vacant lot behind the hostel. You wish you could do something more for them, but the ground is hard and you don't have the energy for niceties like the full six feet. Before you cover them, you tuck their licenses into their pockets and hope that one day you can come back and give them some sort of proper burial.

You take calling the handgun Ellena. You don't know why, but it does feel right. Besides, you think that Ellena would probably find it sweet and not creepy, or at least maybe smile at the idea. You start wandering the neighborhood in Ellena's gasmask. You're pretty sure if you're going to get infected, it'll happen regardless, but it's just, there's something pretty awesome about a gasmask. And it helps your overwhelming urge to hide your face. You feel strong and dangerous when you've got something between you and the rest of the world. A small voice in your head whispers something about avoidance and desensitizing but, screw it, you've never much been one for self analysing.

There's a police station not far from the hostel, one you've skirted around. Any place that's a likely target for either Postals or other survivors. You're not even sure why you're going in now. Sure, it looks empty, but that could mean that someone had gone to a lot of effort to make appear that way. Still, a place like a police station should have some pretty awesome gear in it, that alone might make this worth the risk. Maybe.  
Later you'll say it was your over-active imagination. but right now, you swear you can feel a Postal before you see it. It's barely a second after you walk into the Police Station when you just know something's in there. Something bad. You pull out Ellena and slowly walk forward. You suppose, when faced with a bad feeling, you should probably be backing away, but the idea doesn't really occur to you. Not in an actual This Is An Option kind of way. So you scan the foyer; no movement. At least you're getting better at this, now your gun follows where you're looking on instinct, instead of a lot of constant reminding like you used to.   
You imagine you hear a noise. That's the worst thing about doing this; every breath you take sounds like someone else's, every innocuous creak, like an invasion. You don't completely trust your gut feeling - the idea that you can feel something bad in a place is a little high on the ridiculous scale - you don't trust it completely; but it's a very near thing.  
The hall way next, not the ideal place to be when you're half convinced there's someone at the other end. As you walk down, you note where the doors are; if someone comes out firing, it'll be handy for you to know which door is closest to smash through to - hopefully - safety.   
You wipe your sweaty palms on your jeans and wonder if you should be doing this with your shotgun. It's got a good spread of fire that will give you more of a chance at hitting whatever you're shooting at. But it's also harder to swing around corners, harder to get into rooms without having it stick into the room way before you can get a glimpse of it. Maybe for the hall, you think, slipping Ellena back into your waistband and hooking the shotgun over your head from where it's been resting against your back and making sure it's fully loaded.   
It's funny the sort of thoughts that cross your mind when you're expecting someone to jump out at you. You're thinking the pistol is a comforting pressure along the line of your hip, you're thinking the shotgun feels reassuringly heavy, like you could use it to bash someone's brains in if it came down to that.   
You wonder if you have what it takes to bash someone's head in with a shotgun.  
You reach the end of the hall; that uneasy feeling coming back stronger than ever, and your hand hesitates over the doorknob. The sort of feeling you should probably not ignore. Maybe you could check one of the other rooms, then come back for this one.   
You open the first one back. Interview room, predictably, like it says on the door. All the ones on the left side are. You wonder if you're being silly, not opening a door because you've got a bad feeling about it. On the other hand, if you die here, no one will ever know; and if by some miracle Carey and Maria wake up not Postal, they'll think that you left them to die in lieu of saving yourself. So you ignore the door that gives you such a bad feeling and check the door on the other side of the hall. Offices. The policeman's equivalent to a cubicle farm. You check a drawer. In movies, cop's always put their guns in their desk drawers. It seems unlikely though, surely they'd have all been off waving their guns at Postals when this is all started. Of course, you think, maybe some of them had been infected, perhaps their guns would've remained here.   
It's a somewhat plausible theory, so you don't feel completely ridiculous searching drawers for discarded handguns. Even if it does make you feel like you've stuck yourself in a really bad first person shooter.  
You check half the desk before you start feeling stupid. You almost can't believe you're pansying out of opening a door because it felt scary. Dammit, you are such a wimp. You close the draw you're searching with more force than necessary - wincing at the noise it makes as the metal sliders complain - and make for the hall. Time to show your bad feeling who's boss.  
But when you get to the open door, you swear it feels like someone grabs your arm. It feels like a hand, fingers digging deep in the muscle of your arm, and you slip to the ground. Your hip aches sharply as it bashes on the hard floor. Mother fucker, you look for whatever the fuck pulled you down but nothings there. You look around, frowning and pressing a palm against your hip, seeing nothing. Really, what the actual fuck?  
It's not more than a heartbeat after you hit the floor that leadshot chews up the wall just behind where your head had been. Fuuuuuck You skitter backwards, behind a desk, pulling up your shotgun and crouching out of sight. Whoever is out there swears, and you listen to the footsteps walking in the hall. Soon, you think, tightening your grip on your gun; training it on the doorway. The footsteps stop. Then backtrack down the hall.   
You wonder if there's another way into this room; you never checked. You look wildly around the office, shit, there's a door at the other end of the room.   
Shit shit, shit.   
Which fucking door? You can't hear any footsteps, shit, if you have fucking trapped yourself in here, you're gonna be so damned angry at yourself.   
Dammit, you're gonna have to learn to be smarter than this.   
Maybe you should try for the new door quickly; it might not even connect with the rooms that the person, Postal, is. Shit, you don't know for sure that it is a Postal, even though, for some reason, you're pretty sure you're right.   
Fuck it, you think, standing and rushing for the new door; you pause, just before it, squaring your footing so you can slam your heel into the door without unbalancing. It flings open and you hope you're not about to rush into a hail of gunfire. Screw it, you think, trying to point the gun in every direction. Nothing; more doors. You try to listen, listen for any sort of sound the might indicate where the Postal is, but you can't really hear anything over your heart beat; thundering in your chest, blood throbbing in your ears.   
Stupid, stupid, stupid. Maybe you should make for a window and get the fuck out. If there's people, postals, whatever, here chances are the place has been stripped of anything of value anyway.   
You close your eyes and breath deep. No. You can do this.   
You pick a door.   
If you're maybe imagining a tug on your sleeve from the same side as the door you've chosen, well, there's never going to be any proof of that. Maybe it's some sort of subconscious instinct, you rationalise, manifesting itself as a physical feeling. If that's the case, maybe you're crazier than your average the world just ended brand of crazy. Still. If it helps you survive, is it really such a bad thing?  
So you follow the phantom tug on your sleeve - instinct - and wish you'd bought the Mac-10. Mega Ellena, you think a little hysterically. At least then you could pretend you had more fire power on your side, an illusion of superiority. Instead you're going mano e mano - girl e Postal - armed with a shotgun and a pistol that you're still not very accurate with.  
It's a file room, row after row of shelving filled with file boxes. Your uneasy feeling comes back strong, but at least its not the kick in the guts run feeling you had before.   
You hope you're reading these feelings right.  
You hope it's not completely delusional to be putting your life in the hands of a bad feeling.   
You hear the soft scuffing of shoes, no matter what movies suggest, it's actually really fucking hard to walk silently; especially in dead silence. The footsteps seem to be walking, softly, but hurriedly like they're hoping to catch you in previous room. You slide along the shelving, trying to work out which aisle the footsteps are in, because wouldn't it just suck to go down the wrong one and come face to face with this Postal? You hope you choose the right one and turn, glancing down the other aisle. The Postal - god you're sure she's a Postal is walking past you; sneaking up to the door with a shotgun in hands. Held like she's ready to use it. You don't think, don't really even aim, just raise your own shotgun; tracking her from where she first appeared to halfway across the aisle. Then you squeeze the rigger.  
Maybe she hears you, or sees you, because in that last moment she half turns, her shotgun turning towards you. Fire erupts from the barrel even as leadshot tears her up.  
You curse and flinch back; a sharp stinging sensation in your arm and the boxes to your right disintegrates.  
Slowly you make your way towards the body; heart pounding and trigger finger just waiting for the body to move.  
God, you think with heart rate slowing, you really shouldn't be so fucking attached to the fucking shotgun.   
God but it makes a mess.  
Her mouth is curled up in a snarl, but whatever it is that makes people people is gone. You breath out, and wonder who she was. Wonder - hope - if she was actually a Postal. There's no way of telling that you've been able to figure out. You swallow, unsure of yourself. Maybe you should've called out, said something. What if she had been some sort of really bad ass chick that could've been helpful?  
That thought holds you still for longer than is safe. Noise of gunfire travels far, and even though it's only been ten minutes, at the most, since this girl fired at you in the hall, that's way too long to be hanging around here.   
You sling the shotgun back over your shoulder, and crouch down beside the body. She's got a bandolier around her waist that's only missing a few shells. You get another shell from the shotgun and think about taking it with you; only there’s only so much you can carry, and you're never going to be able to use two shotguns at the same time. Fuck it, you think as you pat her down for anything else. Huh. She's got some sort of hip holster and a - you twist your head sideways and read the engraving - Glock 19. Fucking score. As you clip the holster onto your jeans, you wonder if you should be looking for a shoulder holster for the pistol you have. It'd sure be handy to have one of them.   
In her pants pockets you find two magazines for the pistol, which you quickly appropriate, tucking them into your jacket pocket and jiggling the jacket around to see if they'll fall out.   
You stand up, surveying the body, you wonder if you're turning into a really shitty person, you just looted a girl that you just killed like it was a fucking video game. Hell, you even compared this to a game before.  
A phantom hand seems to squeeze your shoulder; you don't know why you don't startle at it, perhaps it's because you can't actually say when the weight first settled on your shoulder. It feels a little like something your father used to do when he was proud of you and you don't even want to know what that means to your subconscious. It's almost comforting, like someone saying it's okay, you did good, and that just seems batshit insane really.  
As you duck into the street, noting the oncoming dawn and trying to work out if you have enough time to get back to the hostel before light, you realise you don't know how you feel about yourself now.

The last few blocks you run, maybe it's not smart but you don't want to be out when daylight comes. Your hands are slippery with dribbling blood, from the look of your jacket you think the girl must have winged you with that last shot. In the safety of the hostel, after you've replaced the boards and made it look again like a derelict building, you strip off your jacket, dumping all your gear in a messy pile on the floor and getting a good look at your arm.  
It actually doesn't look too bad; not after you wipe the blood away. The blood seems to be coming from a handful of tiny holes that dot the outside of your arm. You swipe the cloth over it again and wonder if you have tweezers.   
Hovering over the first hole with a pair of tweezers you freeze; you catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and what you're about to do makes you gag.   
Jesus Christ you don't wanna do this.   
Fuuuck, you breath the word out aloud and carefully approach press the tweezers end towards the first hole.   
Okay. Ow.   
It hurts more when you hit the leadshot in there; you almost drop everything and give up. Instead you grit you teeth and concentrate on what you're doing; just focus on getting the tweezers around the piece, it's fiddly and slippery and gotcha. You lever it out, ignoring the sharp pains that seem to shoot out every time you bump into inflamed tissue.   
Ow  
You hold the freed piece of metal up, it's a lot of damage for such a tiny piece of lead. You wonder if you'll get lead poisoning from this and wouldn't that just suck?  
Okay, one down, three more to go.  
When you finish you stare at the little holes and wonder what you should cover them with. It's not like you actually have a first aid kit that can handle anything more than splinters, though who ever stocked the kit with goddamned Pokemon bandaid should be shot. What you do have is alcohol. You wander down the hall to the rec room. You know for a fact that there is a stash of alcohol behind the books on the bookshelf. You may have even sampled from them. Several times. Staring at the different brands and types, you wonder which would be the best for pouring onto open wounds; it's not like they have that typed up on their labels along with the PROUD TRADITIONAL DRUNK MAKING drivel. In the end you pick the vodka, it's clear and that's got to be good right? You swear you've heard somewhere that it's fairly pure and stuff? You take a swig of it for some liquid courage and gag, bloody hell vodka needs to be kept in freezer, end of argument.   
Then you upend the bottle over your arm.   
Motherfucker.  
You thump your forehead against the wall and hold back a scream. You hesitantly look at your arm, which doesn't even look like its in pain. You glare at it, then because apparently you're stuck in a ridiculous end of the world scenario, cover each little hole with a pokemon bandaid.  
You check yourself in the mirror, you look greasy skinned, hollowed eyed and tired. You wash your face and stare at the dark little bruises blooming around your arm; the same one that you thought someone had yanked at before. Bruises in the shape of fingers digging in.   
For a moment you stay very still, frozen leaning over the sink, like you've discovered the monster under the bed is very real. Then you try to rationalise it; maybe you bumped it weirdly, after today's stupidity they're definitely not your only bruises. But eventually you decide, if this thing is real - and not just a rally weird manifestation of your subconscious - perhaps you don't have to worry about it; seemed like no matter what it was, dude was on your side.

You make plans to leave. By yourself. A week ago you would have never considered it, but now? Maybe now you've gained a bit of self confidence. Maybe now you've realised you can do this by yourself if you have to. Maybe you'd even enjoy it. You're not sure if that realisation is a good thing or a pretty terrible thing.

The Radio is still your only source of information. Even it's just small tidbits like.   
"Don't go north guys, there's Canadians, if you can believe it, well a small group of them anyway. They've set up shop and are sniping the hell out of any of who crosses into the land they've marked as theirs."  
and  
"There's lights a-blazing in the city again! Of course they're only on in Postal neighborhoods, but still, makes for a nice Don't Go There."  
and  
"London is burning. Actually past tense, London is now smoldering ash. I don't get a whole lot of international info here, but I managed to get in contact with a survivor in England, and apparently London lit up not long after this thing set in, and in the chaos, no one put it out. So take a moment today to think about never seeing London in all her glory."  
Hardly any of it is pertinent to you personally, but still, it's nice to know other people are out there. You wonder how he gets his information.

The next time you go out you're even more cautious. Out in the dead of night; it's the best time really to be out. It's funny, in all the movies - when bad things happen - the night time was always the worst time to be running around. But in real life - here, now - the dark is the best time to be out. Postals don't seem to have any sort of enhanced vision or hearing, so the night puts everyone on even ground.   
It's just a simple supply run - food, water, anything else that catches your eye - but you arm up heavy; you aren't going to get caught wishing for your Mac-10 this time.   
You have to venture further out now, but you don't feel that worried about it. Between the feelings, the shadows and how comforting you now find the lonely, quiet streets, you travel with a new found confidence. You find yourself mostly searching through homes now - sure, you'll stop by the occasional Walmart, but for the most part they've all been looted. It's a little more dangerous - there are still people like you in the city; hiding like you - but it isn't like there's much choice really. So you search through apartment buildings and once-were-homes and marvel at the amount of useless things people stockpiled before they disappeared - dead, Postal or run away - honestly, the sheer number of television sets that look newly looted boggles your mind a little.   
You like apartment buildings the best; there's many rooms, many opportunities, and it's easier to tell if people are still living in them. There's always booby traps or some sort of sign that should be innocuous, but for some reason screams someone lives here. Of course, that's not always the case, you find out that sometimes there isn't a sign or a warning.   
You're in a kitchen, looking in the cupboards when you hear the door open. Oh hell, you think ducking down against the breakfast bar. From your vantage point you should be able to see whoever it is walk in. The footsteps seem to echo through room and you're almost vibrating with anticipation. Quietly you get your shotgun out, ready to point it at whoever's going to walk in.   
It's a man; he's got a pistol out and is looking around the room like he knows you're there. He probably does, maybe he had some sort of way of telling when someone entered his apartment; whatever the answer, he's definitely suspicious. You're not sure what you should do; on one hand you can try to sneak out, on the other, maybe you should just say hi and sorry and get the fuck out of here.   
You like the idea of sneaking, but he seems to be heading in your direction, and you can't see anyway to move without being spotted. So you take a deep breath, pull your gasmask up over your face and call out.  
"Sorry! Don't shoot! I'm sorry." The man swears and points his gun in your direction.   
"Come out." You raise a hand waving it in a way that you hope says don't shoot me in the face.  
"Sorry, I didn't know anyone lived here." You stand completely, holding your shotgun in the least threatening way you know.  
"What are you doing here?" He demands.  
"Scavenging. Didn't know this was anyone's home," You repeat it and hope he'll be reasonable. "I haven't taken anything."  
"Who are you? Where you from?"  
You stare at him through the gasmask's eyeholes. What a bunch of stupid questions.   
"I'm leaving. I won't come back." You start inching around towards the door. "You'll never see me again."  
"Hey, wait!" He grabs out at you and you pull back. His hand grips around your shotguns barrels and you try to yank it back. His other hand reaches up and rips the gasmask from your face.   
Son of a fucking bitch, you think as the rubber straps stretch and tear, pulling at your hair as he yanks at it. You stop trying to pull the shotgun and shove it at him; pushing the butt of it up towards his face. It hits him hard against his collarbone and he growls, letting go of your mask and shoving the gun back at you.  
You fall backwards with him following; his weight crushing against you as you hit the floor hard. He groans, his hands reaching - touching - and you wiggle out from under him; rolling and shakily crouching on the balls of your feet. He gets up and you shout - actually fucking shout - Stay. The. Fuck. Down.  
"Hey, girl, come on." He says like you're being unreasonable and fumbles for your shotgun. Him grabbing at your shotgun just pissed you off. The anger burns up the panic that's trying to claw your chest apart and you reach behind you - reach to where you've now got a Mac-10 shaped bruise forming on your spine - and grab the compact automatic pistol.  
"You fucking come on," You snarl back, pointing the gun halfway down his body. "Now, give me my fucking shotgun back, or I empty this into your fucking junk."  
"Okay, okay, settle down, this just got out of hand okay?" He's talking in what he no doubt thinks is a calming voice; but after his hands have been in your pants, the voice just comes off as creepy and infuriating.  
"Slide it across."  
"Okay, steady now." He says pushing the shotgun across the floor. You kneel down, trying to keep your eyes on him as your free hand gropes around for the shotgun. You grab it and in the tiny moment your eyes are off him when you pull the strap over your head, he moves.   
You don't even think, just squeeze the trigger and don't let go. Fuck he moves quick, ducking and rolling behind the breakfast bar. You don't know whether or not you hit him, but as the bolt slides back with the loud click of I'm out of ammo, he comes back out, pistol in hand. You're already moving, as you turn you throw the empty pistol as hard as you can at him. You catch a glimpse of the gun hitting squarely in the nose and then you're out the door and down the fucking stairs.   
You run for blocks in the wrong direction, sure he'll somehow be following you - tracking you - and it's only when dawn starts brightening the streets that you start making your way back to the hostel. Your hands won't stop shaking, your hairs all tangled up in what's left of the gasmasks straps and every time you pause to catch your breath your eyes start watering and eventually you have to sit down to keep yourself from hyper-ventilating from sobs.  
You're okay. You're okay. You stand up and scrub at your eyes and nose with your sleeve; breathe deep breaths. You're fine.

Maria wakes up to a shotgun pointed at her face. You feel bad, you really do. But prudence beats courtesy these days, and you don't want to end today by having a knock down fight with you now-infected-Postal former best friend. So you point the gun and hope you don't have to pull the trigger.  
"What-?" She asks, voice hoarse from disuse.  
"Just being safe." You answer. "Don't feel the need to kill me do you?"  
"No?" It sounds more like a question than anything else, but you figure if she'd turned she'd have tried something by now. Admittedly you're going off what The Radio has told you, and your own little Postal experiences, but newly turned Postals did seem to be notoriously vicious.

"How long?" She asks when you lower the gun  
"Nearly two weeks."   
"Carey? Tom? Dave? Ellena?"  
"Wait, you knew Ellena's name?"   
"Yeah. Of course."  
"I bet you even speak swedish too."  
"A little bit, yes."  
"Fucking awesome." You say with only a little bit of sarcasm. "Hey, did she ever tell you where she got her gun from?"  
"She was always kind of vague about it." Maria says, shrugging. "Something about a dealer, or a contact, or something. I'm not sure, my Swedish is hella not good."   
"Fuck," You say, laughing. "Maybe she was James Bond."  
"James Bond?" She pauses, a frown on her face. "Wait. What do you mean by 'was'?"  
"She's dead." You meant to break it to her gently, but instead your words come out hard and rushed.   
"Are you sure?" Mary asks and you hold back from glaring at her. Of course you're fucking sure.   
"Yeah, I just buried her in the backyard." You force your tone to be light and jesus it still sounds terrible.  
"What?! What happened? Where is everyone?"  
And that's the question you'd like to never answer. You don't know where to even start beginning to explain all that's happened while she was sleeping. You don't know what to say, and you're not sure how she's going to react to what you do tell her.  
"Well," You say, deciding to stick to just the barest details, then nod across the room to where Carey's sleeping. "Carey's still sick, been down near as long as you. Tom went Postal." You fiddle with the edge of the blanket, it's rough under your fingertips.  
"Postal-Tom killed Ellena. And now they're both buried in the backlot." You pause, wanting to stop but knowing if you do it'll only raise her suspicions. "And Dave left."  
You're not sure why you lie about that. Maybe you just don't want to say 'I killed a guy who tried to kill you' - I saved your life - no one would ever want that hanging around their neck, right? She nods and you hope that's it.  
Later, though, she asks the question.  
"Dave didn't just leave did he?" She asks in a very quiet voice. It might be just your imagination but she seems to be staring at the dark stain Dave left on the floor.  
"No." You don't lie, because there doesn't seem like much point anymore.  
For a moment she looks at you like she's never seen you before, and it's not a great look, but then it passes and she nods. You don't know why, but for that moment, you think you might've wanted her to hate you for the shit you've done. Then again, all those guilty feelings don't stop you from pointing the gun at Carey as he wakes. It's funny how you can feel bad about something, but still be completely prepared to do it all over again.   
"That good, huh?" Carey groans, rolling over and curling into a ball. "No wait, I don't want to know, I'm just going to sleep until you stop pointing the gun and everything is over, k?"   
You wonder what the chances of the two of them actually surviving is.

The day you hear The Radio's last transmission is hard.   
In the broadcast's background you can hear thuds and bangs; and when The Radio speaks he sounds so scared.   
"So, it seems like today might be my last broadcast, don't know whether you can hear all that noise, but let's just say I have some gatecrashers." His voice is surprisingly steady. "So I guess I better make this a pretty damned good last show. Okay. New York City has been classes as Postal Territory, surprise-surprise. Allies have taken the capital, not that it really matters to anyone right now. Shit. Uhh, this broadcast isn't as organised as it could be."  
His voice moves away from the microphone and you lean in close to the speaker - eyes closed - determined not to miss a damned thing; the plastic of the radio creaks as it bends under your tight grip.  
"Shit! Can you hear that? Guess they really want in!"  
His breathing is hard and fast and you think maybe you don't want to listen to this. Oh god you really don't. But the idea of turning the radio off is much, much worse.   
"Okay, guys, this is it, game over." He takes a deep breath, the noise of him inhaling almost covers the background sound of banging and shouting. "My name is Templeton Brooks. I'm fifteen years old. I live in Brooklyn. And I have Postals on my doorstep. My parents went to the shops back when this all began, and never came home, I've pretty much been holed up in the apartment by myself since then. So that's my story, and this is The Radio's signing off the for the last time. It's been." A pause. Angry noises getting closer. "It's been real. Stay alive, get out of the city. Give them hell."  
Then static.   
You cradle the radio in your lap, listening to static in a dark room. 

"So what's the plan?" It's Carey that asks eventually.  
"We have to leave." You say. It's a good plan, you hope. You line out the plan that you and Ellena made, telling them why they shouldn't stay, telling them about the Uniteds, Feds and Allies and trying not to skip any of the details.  
Of course, you spin the details in a way that suggests that leaving is the only smart option. You're leaving regardless of whether they come or not, you know that now, but it'd be sure nice if they came with.  
Carey does point out the one thing you've conveniently not thought about. You're about to be walking into a warzone; from behind enemy lines, through the frontline and hopefully not being mistaken as postals and shot by your side.   
Yeah, it's not the most ideal of situations.

The bridges are fairly well fucked. That's what you've heard.  
"We'll have to check them, anyway." You say leaning over the spread out map that you and Ellena doodled all over. "But from what I've heard, most didn't survive the Evacuation too well, and any of them that did are supposedly watched."  
"What about a boat?" Maria asks. "Something quiet, like a rowboat, or something?"  
"That could work." You say, carefully not mentioning that it was the best idea you've heard. Last time you and Ellena sat down to plan an exit, you both ended up wasting a day planning up a faux suicidal attack on a Postal neighborhood.  
"A rowboat?" Carey asks with a look of disbelief. "Dude, can't we at least get something with an engine?"  
"Carey, it's dead silent out there. You'll hear an engine start up from the other side of fucking New Jersey."  
"Okay, fine," He says holding his hands up in mock surrender. "But I'm just letting you know I'm gonna suck at rowing. These arms might be made for Halo, but I am no Spartan."  
Maria laughs and you feel out of the loop; you guess it's some sort of gamer humor.  
"He has a point though," You say. "I don't think I've ever seen a rowboat in real life, let alone sat in one. Is this really something we can do?"  
"Relax, when I was little, my Ma and me used to kayak in this river near home. It's a slightly different action, but the principles are basically same. Oar in the river - push - oar out of the river; rinse and repeat."  
"Okay," You say nodding, it does sound doable. "We'll scout the river tonight, so we'll have to pack and be ready to leave."  
"What's the rush?"   
"If we see a chance to cross over, we're gonna have to take it then and there because it's not likely to be there tomorrow night."

Throughout the day you pack. It's funny, you don't really have that many belongings that you actually feel the need to take with you. Guns, ammunition, spare change of clothes, tin cans of varying foods and as much water as you can stand to carry. In the lobby, you sling your shotgun's strap over your shoulder and jog around experimentally, trying to see if everything sits well and comfortably.  
"I got another Ellena, if you want it?" You ask, as you fiddle with your glock's holster.   
"That is so weird, you calling them that." Maria says with a half frowning face. "It's really almost wrong."  
"Is it?" You ask, staring at the pistol in your hand. "It is a bit, probably."   
Then you shrug and offer the gun.  
"You want it anyway?"  
She nods, taking it and checking it in that practiced manner that always makes you so jealous. You always look like you're thinking really hard about what you're doing.  
"A gas mask? Really?" Maria looks at you with an eyebrow raised; you pause, mask half way over your head.  
"What?"  
"Really?"  
"Gas masks are awesome, not even gonna lie." You say grinning as you yank it down around your neck. Mostly, though, you just don't want to leave it behind.

"Should we take the radio?" Maria asks.  
"The Radio's dead." You say, it comes out harsher than you meant.  
"Ran outta batteries? Don't we have spares somewhere?"  
"The Radio is dead." You say, your mouth a hard flat line.   
She doesn't push the subject any further.  
"Okay, you guys, listen up." You call out, tucking your thumbs behind your backpack's straps. "We're going to be extra careful out there. We're going to be quiet. And if anyone hears anything, hell, even thinks they maybe heard something, we all stop and wait. If we have to we can backtrack back here, and try another night."  
"Ha ha, okay mom." Carey laughs, but Maria looks at you seriously.  
"Just how dangerous is it out there?"  
"Well, you remember how it was last time we went out? When there was all the random shootings and screaming and sirens?" Maria nods. "Well, it's worse now. Postal's are all organised and have hunting parties. The survivors are nearly worse. They are seriously scary motherfuckers, if we meet any of them I suggest we back up and get the fuck away from them."  
"Why? I'd have thought survivors would try to stick together."  
You shrug.  
"It's 'cos you can't tell a Postal from a normal person. Not by looking at them. And besides, people are greedy, evil, little bastards." You grin and hope you don't look like a complete psychopath.

Somehow it's more nerve racking to wander around in the dark with friends than when it was just you. You guess that's half because if you screw up now, all of you go down. That, and you have no control over what the other two do. You've told them how dangerous it is out there, told them to keep quiet and aware, but you're not sure if they've really understood the situation. Hell, you're not sure you entirely understand the situation. Even though you've done a fair amount wandering and exploring you haven't really gotten a close look at the river. At first it was because you were avoiding the waves of people during the Evacuation and all the chaos that went with masses of scared people bottle-necking themselves into tiny walkways and bridges.   
After you avoided it because there was always too much activity going on near them; people trying to cross, Postals trying to barricade the exits. So you don't really have much knowledge about the area at all. You wish Ellena was still here, you have no doubt that she would've scouted the hell out of all the ways to get off Long Island.   
"Fuck, how do we even find a row boat?" Carey asks, staring out at the dark water.  
"Maybe we should be looking in people's backyards?" Maria suggests with a nervous giggle. "I didn't think of it before, but I guess all the ones that were on the shore would've been taken."  
You nod. "I didn't think about it either, to be honest. How 'bout we check the bridges, then move a street back and look at the houses close to the river?"  
"Whatever man," Carey shrugs. "My bag is killing me, yo."  
"I am so glad you're with us," Maria laughs. "Can you imagine how helpless we would be without a manly presence?"  
"Fuck all y'all." Carey proclaims, flipping his middle finger up at the two of you. "I've been sick! And I'm Canadian! I'm allowed to be weak."  
"I thought that meant you were supposed to be a lumberjack." Maria snidely suggests while you add,  
"I bet if Maria was Canadian she'd be just as feisty and bad ass."   
"Fuck you Maria, and fuck you too Shannon. Also, Maria doesn't count, I bet she was just bad ass from birth. I bet she came out of her Mama saying 'Fuck, but I'd kill for a beer'."  
"It's true," Maria shrugs and grins. "Popular misconception that us Alabama babies are a little slow. Truth is we are actually born quite clever, then we kill it all of with alcohol."  
"Hey, did you guys see that?" His tone changes so much that you stop almost immediately.  
"Don't change the subject when we're mocking you." Maria laughs.  
"No, no, no, look!" He points over to the foot of a bridge.  
For a moment you see nothing.  
"Honestly, if you're just dicking around and pretend to see shit.." Maria complains.  
"No look, it's a light. Like a flashlight or something."  
You stare at where he's pointing; the dark seems to move and shift as your eyes try to see whatever he's seeing. Finally you see a flash, a dull glow really, like someone's carrying a not very bright torch.  
"Do you think it's a Postal?" Maria whispers.  
"No." You shake your head, you don't think Postals would be using such a dull light. It's not like they had any reason to hide.  
"Then it's people!" Carey says, excited and loud.   
"Sssh!"  
"Oh come on! Let's go talk to them!"  
"Quiet! We don't know who they are, or how friendly they are." You say the words, but you can already see the idea of meeting new people, survivors like yourselves, has already taken a hold of them.   
"You guys are jerks." You grumble, not admitting that you're kind of interested in meeting survivors; if they've managed to last this long, then perhaps knowing them and having them around would be a good idea. "Okay, we'll go say hello. BUT! We do this quietly and calmly, with no sudden movements. If I say run, or get the fuck out of there, you don't question, you just get the fuck out of there and go back to the hostel. And for god's sake, don't tell them about the hostel."   
As you get closer you begin to doubt your plan. If the bridge is clear, maybe you just sneak across behind them, and they never need know you were there.   
But, of course, you never get the chance to voice that option because when you get close enough Carey shouts out, Hey! Hey, you guys! And an assortment of weapons are suddenly pointed at you.  
"No! No! It's okay!" You shout coming out in front, as Maria punches Carey's shoulder and Carey grins weakly and mouths sorry. "Didn't mean to startle you, my friend here just forgot the meaning of calm and subtle, is all."  
"Go away!" A man shouts, waving a rifle in your direction and you wonder if your draw is quick enough.  
It probably is.  
Your hand has lowered maybe a fraction when a woman speaks up.  
"What do you want?"  
"Nothing." Maria calls out, placing a hand on your elbow. "We're just looking to get out of the city."  
"You going south or west?"  
"West, heard the borders closer that way. Anyway it's getting too dangerous in the city."  
"You're not wrong." The woman chuckles and everyone seems to relax slightly. "Alright, you can come closer. Just keep your hands where we can see them."  
"Any you guys sick?" The man asks sharply.  
"No." You answer quickly but not fast enough to stop maria from answering.  
"Not anymore." You glare at her, come on people, a little distrust will get you far.  
"Proper survivors, huh?" The man says with a thoughtful look. "Well we've got a few of them too, don't you worry."  
You watch their faces, trying to see if they're lying about that. The don't seem to be lying; in fact they look genuinely happy to see other survivors. Maybe you shouldn't be such a fucking pessimist.  
"Name's Rob, my wife Helen, and the rest of the guys we've picked up since Coney Island." A giggle goes through the group and you figure that most of them started their acquaintance with Helen and Rob at Gunpoint. What's more surprising to you is that they've come all the way from Coney Island. The coast is all Postal territory.   
"Shannon." You introduce yourself as Maria and Carey pipe up with their names.   
"You guys don't sound like you're from around here." Helen says with a slight questioning lilt.  
"Tourists," Maria drawls. "Don't hold it against us."  
"Jesus, shitty time for a holiday."  
"What do you think of our fair town?" Rob asks, bitter grin splitting his face.  
"I gotta be honest, I'm ready to go home. People here are crazy." Carey jokes, and somehow manages to get everyone tittering quietly; at ease with the idea of new people.  
"Can we move this conversation to the other side of the river?"  
Rob nods and starts herding his people while still closely watching your group. It makes you smile, thinking that the two of you should hit it off excellently, just on the principle of being untrusting bastards.

They're a group of maybe ten. All of them seem to have had the same idea as you - getting the hell outta dodge. Maria and Carey act like they're long lost sibling but you feel unnerved and uneasy. A girl in the group glances at you and something about her sets your teeth on edge. You try to ignore it, the groups been together for the last week or so, surely if she was something sinister, she'd have tried something by now. Still, you resign yourself to watching her warily, untrusting. You don't why yet, but you're sure you'll figure it out. You just hope you figure it out sooner rather than later.

Manhattan is strangely empty. An eerie no man's land between Postal strongholds. There's been rumors that some West Pointers took a hold of some of it; but walking down the streets now, none of it looks like scenes of battle. It just looks empty. That maybe creeps you out more than anything. At least on the other side of the river there was signs of once-were-people everywhere. Cars, things smashed, rubbish, notes left on doors, graffiti messages to loved ones and everyone; the entire area teemed with crushing loss, hope and defiance. Here it looks like everything remotely human has been scrubbed clean. Even the abandoned cars look more like they've been properly fucking parallel parked and then walked away from. And yet, for all the emptiness, there’s this horrible itching feeling of eyes following your every movement. You can't tell if its your imagination or if it's real, goddamn it makes your skin crawl. Walking into Central Park is almost worse. Its bizarre as all hell and all this added weirdness is not at all helping your ill feelings towards being in this group.

"Hey, you okay?" Maria looks at you, worried. You've been acting off since you all joined up with the group and she's started to notice. You think about lying to her - god knows she'll believe you if you tell her you're just a little upset over the whole end of the world thing - but you kind of really want to know if you're not completely cracked.  
"Can I tell you something? Something you can't tell anyone, not even Carey?"  
"Mm-hmm."   
"I think I'm going insane. Sometimes I think I can tell something's going to go bad before it happens. Like when Tom turned, I knew something was off, but I ignored it."  
"So you think you're psychic now?" Maria asks skeptically.  
"No, it's not psychic, that's stupid. It's like I can feel something, like a shadow or something, creeping in and waiting for something bad to happen." You run a hand over your hair, pushing it back from your face, and sigh. "I don't know. Maybe I'm infected and don't know it. You think that's even remotely possible?"  
"I think if you were infected, you'd have killed us all by now. You've certainly had more than enough chances." She smiles and you shrug. Maybe she's right. "Got any bad feelings now?"  
She asks it as a joke, but sobers up pretty quickly when you answer.  
"Yeah, I do."  
"What's it about?" Maria asks frowning.  
You nod as discreetly as you can in the direction of the girl that make you feel uneasy.  
"What about her?"  
Your nose scrunches up as you try to think of a way to describe something that you don't really quite get yourself. But your expression must speak for itself because Maria looks back at the girl, looking for whatever you're seeing in her.  
"Think she's bad?"  
"One of them."   
At first you think you might be fucking crazy. A Postal? Her? It seems more unlikely than anything else. But then, the more you think about it, the more it makes sense in your head.   
"A Postal? Really? Wouldn't she be, like, killing us all by now?"  
"They calm down, they say they calm down." You mumble, looking down at your hands; you don't know when you got so weird, why you keep avoiding eye contact and hunching your shoulders when people are staring at you.  
"Look, if she's really a 'calm'" - You can practically hear the quotation marks - "Postal, do you really think she'd be walking hand in hand with one of us? All the way to the border? Where she'll be surrounded by more of us?"  
You shrug and look away. Maria sighs, then stands up to see who Carey is bothering now.   
Conversation over, you think.

"She is a Postal." The words are out of your mouth before you even realise you're thinking them. The group looks around in surprise and you fumble for Ellena. Someone shouts and grabs you, takes your gun. You can hear someone telling you to calm down, it's okay, you're being paranoid, but you can feel how wrong she is; like a dark shadow is hanging over her. You see her eyes flash with anger and try to lunge at her again; try to get rid of the hands holding you back. Somewhere you can hear Maria saying hold up, she knows what's she's talking about and someone else saying that you're crazy, that you're one of them.  
Someone's grip on you loosens, doubts creeping in, you're pretty sure if their grip loosens much more you'll be able to reach Ellena. You almost see the exact moment the Postal decides her cover's blown. You try to yell out a warning, even though you're not sure what you want to warn them about; but before you work it out gunfire explodes all around them. Muzzle flashes seem to be coming from everywhere, blinding in the night, and as everyone scatters you realise that most of the shooting isn't coming from the group. Wildly, you look for Maria and Carey - this is an ambush - as you run - stumble - flee into the dark.

You don't know how far you run; it's difficult to run in the dark, you've already hit so many dark shapes with your goddamned shins that your pace is slowing, without you noticing, in anticipation for the next thing you'll run into.   
You think you hear something, gunfire is still sporadically lighting up in the distance but there's no way of tell whether the person you're hearing is Postal or not. You pull out Ellena, crouching low and looking for the source of the noise. You haven't seen anything shadowy so you're feeling pretty optimistic on the chances of this being just a normal person. Still doesn't hurt to be prepared.  
You miss your fucking shotgun. It's like losing an arm - which seems a little extreme to be sure - but it hasn't left your side since you first picked it up and now it's gone.   
Carey comes crashing onto the loose gravel, slipping at the sudden change of terrain.  
"Shiit!" He yells with arms flailing.  
You smile and lower Ellena. He hears you moving and spins around so fast he almost loses his footing again.  
"Holy shit, Shannon, hey!"   
"Were you followed?"  
"Don't think so." He's panting and trying to look in every direction at the same time.   
"What happened to your shotgun?" Dammit, you were hoping you'd be able to take his. You don't know why, but you find it really comfortable to have a shotgun in hand.  
"I, uuh, dropped it? I think? I don't know man. The fuck did they come from?"  
"Same place we did, I suppose. Guess they're trying to make sure none of us get out."  
"But. I don't. How." He pauses and breathes. "I don't get how no one noticed her. She was a fucking Postal, man, how the fuck did no one notice?"  
"They get smarter, calm down after awhile. That's what The Radio said." Honestly? You don't see how it matters anyway, if anything, now you know to avoid groups of people you don't know. Now maybe you'll follow your instincts a little more promptly. "Doesn't matter. Let's just keep going west."  
"What about Maria?"   
You look at him, holding back any hard and blunt words that your brain suggests you should say.  
"Hopefully she's going for the border. If she is, we'll meet up, okay? Fuck, I want a shotgun."  
"You're a little different than before, you know." He looks sideways at you. "You were really quiet before. I mean, you're quiet now but, well, you're crazy intense. You know what I mean?"  
You look at him, not sure how to answer that.  
Back home, once upon a time, one of your few friends said you were a blank slate. You think she meant it as compliment, despite how it sounded. Now you think that maybe she was right. Before you never felt like you had anything that really defined you, nothing that you actually ever felt strongly about. Now it looks like your blank slate is filling up. Admittedly it's filled with things like 'aims gun first, 'trusts bad feelings' and 'quick-kills Postals'; and your friends follow you because you're safe, even while they look at you with that odd look of horror mixed with awe. Still, it feels good to have things about yourself that you can rely on. It's kind of funny that it took the end of the world for you to grow into an individual. Either that, or it's really quite tragic.

Like all runs of good luck, it ends quickly, and horribly with a gun in your face and no where to run. Carey sounds like he's trying not to cry, you wonder if this guy followed had Carey, and you can feel that phantom hand on your shoulder. It feels like it wants you to stay very still. You trust it more than you trust Carey's no one followed me.  
"Toss the gun down." The man snarls angrily.  
And he's not killing you. Why isn't he killing you?  
Fuck it, if he's not killing you, maybe that'll work in your advantage. He gets close - lowering his gun and pulling out a zip tie; grabbing at your wrists - and you hit him. It's not a great hit, but its enough that you've got the room to slam you forearm into his gun hand and send the weapon spinning off into the bushes.  
The look on his face says that he no longer cares about keeping you alive.  
“Carey! Run!” You yell and don't look to see if he listens.  
He lunges at you; his weight pushing you to the ground. You twist under him, shoving an elbow up under his chin as his hands reach for your throat. He grunts and you push up; throwing him to the side. He rolls away and you mirror the action; gravel digging into your knees as you skid across the abrasive surface. The postal snarls and launches himself at you. You brace yourself for the impact and your fingertips brush past the familiar cold metal of Ellena. The Postal slams into you as your finger curl around the pistol's grip. You both end up sprawled on the ground and you can feel him drawing back. then his fist smashes into your cheek. You don't think you've ever been punched before. And it hurts. A lot. You feel him draw his arm back again - preparing for another hit - and you realise you've still got Ellena in your hand.   
Take this, motherfucker, you think as you bring it in close and shove it upwards. He doesn't even pause in his swing, not even when he feels the barrel push up against his adam's apple, and you don't hesitate.  
You're still levering the body off you when Carey comes back to the clearing. He looks horrified when he sees the thick blood congealing on your shirt. Apart from the uncomfortable wet soaking through you can't give yourself to give a damn about some fucking Postal's blood on you.  
"Thought you said no one followed you." You say wiping at the blood on your shirt but really just making a bigger mess.  
"Fuck. Shit. I'm sorry." He sounds so fucking sorry that you actually laugh. The sound is all kinds of inappropriate and that makes you laugh harder.  
"Thought I told you to run." You say as he grabs your arm and pulls you upright.  
He smiles weakly and says nothing.

You think you've gotten away. You're still in central park, you've still got to get across the Hudson, your uneasy Get The Fuck Out feeling is going off the fucking scales and you're missing your goddamned shotgun but you can deal with all of that. 

Then you feel cold steel press against the back of your neck. A Postal is right behind you with his guns barrel pressing against the base of your skull.  
You can't describe that feeling. It seems like a simple thing, metal against the skin, but the sensation combined with the mental image of every fucking dead body you've seen and you gag, your body rebelling against every goddamned thing.   
"Hands."   
You can't move, part of you really wants to do what he says, really wants to do anything that will help you live a little longer, but another part is screaming try something, do something, god don't let them take you and the indecision keeps you frozen.  
The cold leaves your neck for a moment and it comes down hard on the side of your head. You stumble, mind blank from the pain, barely feeling the Postal pulling your hands behind your back and tying them together. When your head clears, you look around for Carey; he's mirroring you, another Postal ziptying his hands together while his face projects confusion and terror and help me.   
The Postal jerks you up straight, his tight grip digging into your arm, and all you can think is what the fuck is going on?  
After you're marched back to the original ambush scene. Other subdued members of the group look up with a mix of sullen anger and fear and your heart skips a beat as it realises Maria's not there. Carey looks at you, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly as the idea of Maria getting away wars with the fact that you guys didn't. You grin at him, even though it almost physically fucking hurts to smile. It's not that you're actually that hurt, your face feels a little numb and swollen from the punch but it's more that its just so fucking hard to smile when oh god you wish it was me and your brain keeps sneaking in thoughts like she's dead, she'd have never made it out, why her? and what the hell are they going to do to you?  
You hate that you think things like that, so you grin even if it hurts, especially if it hurts, and make it the most viciously happy grin you can make.  
Carey's barely there smile widens as his cheek dimples in and pretty soon his smile mirrors yours. You think maybe that's worth something.  
They march you for miles, you still have no idea what's going on or even where you're going, but the direction seems to be west. Soon you're crossing the George Washington Bridge, which is pretty in the glow of pre-dawn, you remember thinking that as you cross, and then feeling a little guilty about admiring architecture and engineering while being forced marched to somewhere.  
Slowly the city peters off and you realise that you actually managed it; albeit in Postal custody, you've finally left New York City.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one is a little dark - i accidentally almost gave my friend a minor claustrophobia attack - EXTRA WARNINGS for death camps and all that comes with that, if you have claustrophobia i might suggest skipping this chapter, also if you think theres any warning you think should go up in the main warnings please let me know

_**Death Camp Waltz (slowly following the footsteps of others)**_  
They hold you down and scratch the numbers and squiggles into your skin  
It hurts, like a burn that they won't stop poking, but it's not intolerable. The tattoo sits almost directly over your heart and you wonder wildly if its some sort of target; an _aim here_ if you will.  
It's funny - well mildly amusing and odd in light of the whole _being captured by homicidal Postal motherfuckers_ \- but what's really annoying you is the fact that you've lost Ellena, your gasmask, your shotgun and all your gear. Your hands feel too light and useless when they're empty, and you keep ducking your head and reaching for your mask before realising it's missing. You don't like the empty feeling that the loss of your possessions weight leaves your with. Somehow you're less you without all of your gear.  
  
You're taken to a place that looks like they've attempted to make it look not so fucking sinister, but the end result looks like a macabre mix between summer camp, army barracks and nazi germany. There's nothing to suggest this place isn't just a holding place for you, but you can almost feel its intent. Those dark shapes you see - the one's that aren't really there - cling to everything like moss in a forest. When you're all marched in the dark seems to swell like they've been waiting for you all along.  
"This is a death camp." You say before your brain can filter them, the oppressive, _heavy_ atmosphere making you grit your teeth.  
Behind you an older man makes shushing noises and you feel a little bad for blurting it out like that. Regardless of how true you think it is.  
  
You've been seeing shadows behind people for awhile now. Shit out of the corner of your eye, things that look a lot like something you don't ever want to see. You take to calling it, in your head, your psychosis. Maybe you are actually seeing death walk around the grounds, but at the moment you're refusing that possibility.  
  
You rub at the tattoo on your chest; it's itching, which you suppose means it's healing. That thought is odd, your death camp tattoo healing.   
  
You're burying your predecessors, you think as you shovel, like some sort of fucked up circle of life. Maybe, one day, someone is going to do the same for you.   
  
"They've got prisons too, you know. Don't know why though. Don't they want us all dead?" Carey talks - babbles - sometimes like he doesn't care if anyone's actually listening. You wonder where he gets his information from.  
  
"You know how I said that I stayed because I thought I could help?" You nod, finger to your lips as you try to remind him to keep quiet. "I lied. I was scared, you know? I just thought I was going crazy, seeing patterns and the apocalypse in nothing. I never believed anything bad was happening. I was so scared. Do you think I could've helped if I had actually tried to?"  
You look at him, you can almost see his skull just barely beneath his skin; he's wasting away so fast.  
"This isn't your fault." You say it quietly, but with force. "And we're all scared."  
He closes his eyes and you tap his cheek.  
"And we are not going to die here. Not today."   
"How can you be so sure?" He mumbles.  
When you were little your father would take you by the hand and tell you that death was always looking for you. He would tell you to look death in the eye, never flinching, and tell him _not today_. Your mother always got angry when she found him telling you that. She'd tell him off for scaring you, even though you were too wide eyed and believing to be that scared.   
She'd crossed herself to ward away even the idea of death. You had laughed at her for being so superstitious and your father had shushed you. Your mother was right, he'd said, once you denied death he would always be looking for you, waiting for just one moment of weakness.  
You always figured that Dad knew what he was talking about. He'd lost a hand and been shot once, many years ago. He'd lived despite all that, and you think that probably made him a pretty good authority on the whole death issue.  
You don't tell Carey that. Instead you say.  
"Bitch, I don't know how to die."  
He smiles. Slightly, tiredly.  
  
You feel as brittle as sun bleached bones; left too long in the elements. You wonder why you don't splinter when you fall, why you don't crack under the weight of all the bodies.   
But you're getting better, learning to shut down any thought that tries to surface. Maybe you're just being desensitised, you don't know, it's just easier to be numb and blank, much easier than dealing with the crushing weight of what you're doing, mixed in with the constant rolling uneasy nausea that you get when you're around Postals. Shit, no wonder you're losing weight.  
  
You're pretty sure you're not supposed to have a preferred method of dealing with bodies. But you do. Burying is filthy, hard work and the bodies are always going bad by the time you start pushing them into the ground. At least burning them is quicker. Even if the ashes fall back down - thick and you try to not breathe them in - it's like snow that doesn't melt. Carey says it's gross as fuck, but it reminds you of that old _ashes to ashes; dust to dust_ thing and makes you think that maybe it's the natural order of things. Carey says you're weird as fuck.  
But it's easier to wax lyrically about death when you aren't spending day after day handling bodies bloated with gases. That smell never quite leaves your hands.  
You call it the circle of life with an out of place grin, and Carey says, "You're kind of New Age-y sometimes. You know, if hippies carried guns and were all shoot first, ask questions later."  
You can live with that description.  
  
There's been talking; rumors that no one actually believes but everyone's still passing around, because the alternative is bleak and completely lacking of hope. The talks of the Uniteds, Feds or Allies - the faction seems to depend on the teller - whoever they are, supposedly they're pushing forwards, actually forcing the Postal's to lose ground. Word is that maybe the stay here isn't as permanent and terminal as previously thought.  
Only, the Postals hear those rumors too. And they aren't about to just let you all go.

The day it happens, you can feel something is wrong, and you're pretty sure you're not mistaken. You _know_ somethings off when they start herding you - yelling and pushing everyone like there is suddenly a big rush for you to move. Everyone else seems to take this new indignity in stride - it's not the first time you've been forced marched from one place to another - but you can't help but think this time is different. You try to find Carey and warn him, but a guard shoves you onwards and the shadow behind him tells you now isn't the time to try anything.

When they line your group along the edge of a ditch, fear shoots through the crowd like wildfire. But it's too late. You don't even hear the sound of the Postals firing at you; all you hear is the screaming and crying of terrified people.

Then comes the shoving as people start trying to get back away from the Postals firing their guns. The crowd moves like a rolling wave of rats; scrabbling for imagined safety; pushing and shoving as people - bodies - start falling. You try to steady yourself, holding the people either side of you for balance and planting your feet squarely. Carey has to be in the crowd, somewhere, but when you look for him all you see is scared faces and falling bodies.  
Some part of your mind is screaming in terror, but there’s this a quiet spot in there, deep, a bit that’s calming and steady. It's not saying you'll survive this, but it is saying it'll be alright regardless. You hang onto the calm bit even when the crying lady beside you takes a round in the temple and falls soundlessly against you. Her tears - her blood - soaks into your filthy shirt, her weights pushes you back towards the ditch. You stumble, trying to shove her off you, and something clips the side of your head. Your vision greys with the sudden mind numbing pain, you step back - trying to find even footing - and your foot finds nothing but air. Then you're falling.   
_It's a long way down,_ you think clearly before you hit the bottom. The blackness of unconsciousness rolling and crashing down on you like a wave. You hear, dimly, the crunch of your body landing heavily and then nothing more.  
  
You wake up choking. Your head hurts, you can't see a damned thing and there's this weight on you. Disorientated and still mostly out of it, you shove at the weight. It gives slightly, bending away where your hands touch it and - is that dirt? - _dirt_ showers all over you. You cough, you throat feels raw, and you taste blood and vomit as you choke your way through another cough. You try to breathe, ignoring the poor quality air and soil mixture that you seem to be inhaling. You twist around, slowly worming your hand up to your face and pulling you t-shirt up over your nose. It's not great, but it filters the air a little better. You push against the weight on you again, this time sideways. The weight pinning your legs lessens and you wriggle - squirm - climb your way up. Up. Up _God, you hope you're going up_ \- your head feels like it's been caved in, you're maybe concussed and you're fighting panic; which are shitty things on a good day. Here, now? You gulp and try not to throw up or start thinking about how fucking little you can move.   
You're starting to pull together your memory of what happened, the foggy mess of your brain is slowly lifting and the flashes of what you are remembering aren't helping your Do Not Panic plan. Finally light - glorious fresh morning sunlight.  
It's only been a few minutes since you woke, but, _oh god_ it seemed like hours and you want out. You take a deep breath of fresh air - gasping and almost hyperventilating - as you wrench your arm up and use it to lever yourself up and out.

You have to pull at your legs, but they finally give and you fall backwards and just lay there; enjoying the air and the feeling of no weight on you. You lay there, on your back, until your breath slows down, then you stay a little longer, eyes closed and almost sleeping.  
You don't move again, not until the sun is baring down from straight above you; it's heat making what you're lying on shift and groan and the mud on your face dry and flake away from the skin.   
It's uncomfortably warm and god you love it.  
You open your eyes, temporarily blinded by the brightness of the day, and roll over. You smell what you've been lying on before you actually see it. Maybe deep down in your mind you've known all along, but it's been shoved down, stomped on, put in a box and labelled 'not today'; but rolling over and finding yourself lying on - leaning on, resting your hands on - a pile of barely buried bodies?

No amount of pretending is going to unsee that shit.

You almost throw up; in your head you can hear yourself start to blame the nausea on your head wound, but _fuck_ , you think you're entitled to feel the need to vomit after digging yourself out of a pile of bodies. In fact, hell, it might even be expected.   
Moving slowly, you crawl backwards, whispering apologies as you touch each squishy, beginning - to - bloat body. Finally you make the edge. It feels wonderful to have solid ground beneath your hands. _You don't want to_ , you think as you push yourself to your feet, _you really don't want to look back_.  
But it's something you're pretty sure you should do. Despite anyone who might stumble across this place in the future, no one is going to remember this quite like you will.  
So you look.  
It's not pretty, bodies twisted up in death throes, covered lightly by a few shovelfuls of dirt. None of them look like they're sleeping peacefully, you think bitterly as you fight the urge to just _sit_ and _stop_.  
You think if you do that you may never start again.  
But you're alive, you say it brightly in your mind like it's a great fucking thing and you stay standing. You force yourself to take one last long look.   
_Carey's in there somewhere_. It's a small sad thought in a sea of numbness and it barely ripples the surface as you shove it back under; down with thoughts like _that should've been me_ and _oh god why wasn't it?_. Instead you take a deep breath and swivel away.

_Sorry_ , you think. _Not today. One day, but not today_  
  


You get maybe a kilometre away before you have to stop; you're bleary eyed, shaking and dry heaving. You figure if someone was going to find you, they'd have done it by now. So you curl under some shrubbery, the soil under it cool from where the foliage protects it from the sun's heat, and sleep. Maybe you shouldn't sleep. You think you might've read, or heard, something about sleeping with a concussion being a big no-no, but to hell with it. Everything hurts, you're more tired than you've ever been and there's a cut on your arm that looks suspiciously like the stab marks on the bodies that had less than fatal bullet wounds. Sleeping is a better alternative to thinking about how much chance went into your survival any fucking day.  
So you sleep. And dream of dark shadows that stand behind you, with a comforting hand on you shoulder, holding it tight.  
  
It's almost dark when you surface back to the land of the living. You blink bleary eyes and feel adrift fro a moment. It feels like you've come out of the ground as some one else; nameless and new. It's not amnesia or anything so quaint - despite the bloody, raw patch of missing skin in your hair - you still know your name and all those little bits of memory that makes you _you_. It's just that you don't feel like that person anymore. You think that maybe she got left behind; under the loose soil with all the other dead people. Now, maybe, you're someone - maybe something - new.   
Your head aches with each movement, but it's not the the skull splitting pain you had before you crashed so you take that as a sigh that your heads not too badly fucked up. _No matter_ , you think, sighting the dying glow of the sun and using it to direct you west. You know the border's close - gotta be - there's no way the Postal's would've panicked and done _that_ if the rumor didn't have some kernel of truth in it.  
  
You stumble mostly - you don't seem to be able to keep very steady on your feet - but you do make your way slowly in what you hope is west. It's getting hard to really tell which way you're supposed to be heading. In theory you think you should probably sit down and rest and hope that later you feel better, but you think if you sit down you're not sure you'll be able to get back up. So you're walking - a stumbling shuffle - and you figure even if you're going in the wrong way, well at least you're moving away from _that_ place.   
It's just on dawn when they find you, or rather you find them. By that time you don't know how far you've walked, black spots are dancing in front of your eyes and you're fairly sure you are going to fall over soon.   
You don't even notice them at first; you're just walking, that is what your entire world has narrowed down to. They almost don't seem to believe what they're seeing as you walk past and it's only when one of the grabs you that your brain acknowledges that, yes, you're not alone. Reality comes crashing back into focus and you blink at the hand holding your arm. _Postals_ , you've managed to walk into a camp of Postals. Some part of you is disgusted that you didn't notice them, but most of you just doesn't care. Later you're going to blame that in the concussion and shock. But for now you settle for tired and just don't give a fuck. Hell, maybe you're just ready to give up.  
But they don't kill you.

At first you figure they'll just take you back to a deathcamp, or leave you dead in a ditch somewhere. Instead they march you to what was - and still is - a prison. You had heard vague rumors of places like these, places where the Postal's attempt to infect and turn the surviving population.   
You always figured them to be the bogeymen of rumors.  
As it turns out Infection Prisons are very fucking real.


	4. Prison Blues (tales of misfortune to a mean guitar)

  
When they bring you in they catalogue you like an experiment.  
They don't like your number and squiggles tattoo; the guards get agitated and you think maybe this is it, they wouldn't be acting so strange if they didn't know exactly what it meant. The two people you were brought in with subtlely shrink away from you, distancing themselves, it's smart and right now you'd fucking love to do that too.  
Another Postal comes in, maybe the other guys' boss from the way they defer to him. He pokes his finger at your tattoo; hard.  
"Hey!" You complain, flinching back and covering it with your hand. "That fucking hurts you know!"  
His eyes flash, that deep hate that seems to run through every Postal's veins bubbles up for a moment and it's a sharp reminder that no matter how calm they look, a Postal's nature is always just below the surface. For that moment you're sure he's going to start hitting you and not stop until you're nothing more than a stain on the concrete.  
Instead you're afforded the courtesy of everyone watching you like you’re one dangerous motherfucker; which you're not, you're really not.  
At the moment you feel like a blank slate again, stripped of all the things that had come to define you and adrift in the middle of something that’s a lot bigger than it first appeared. The thought that the end of your world is only a small part of all this makes you smile a little, though the humour behind it is darker than dark.  
You overhear them call you lucky and you wonder about that. It's not like you're thinking 'oh I wish I was dead', because you're not. You like being alive. You _really_ like being alive. You must, you figure, from the way you've fought tooth and nail to stay that way.  
But sometimes you think that maybe the dead are the luckier ones; this has all ended for them. Eternal fucking peace.  
  
The water they use on you is cold and the pressure behind it aggravates every bruise and hurt you have; but it washes away the stench of death that's been deep in your pores for days. It's a little strange, you think at the water stops and you're left shivering and desperately wishing for a towel, it's a little strange how much a person could change. Not that long ago you were wishing you'd never see a dead body again; now you'd be just be happy if you never again had to deal with the smell of rotting blood.  
  
They stab a syringe full of _red_ into your arm and, well, you refuse to think about that. When they ask you for your name you refuse. It's a small rebellion, minuscule and pointless, but it's something. They scribble in GIRL E over the name section and you think, half amused, _I'm not even that original in my defiance_.  
  
It's weird being in a prison. So different from the death camp. There, people had been forged together with misery and death; here, people seemed to fight over every scrap, from food to respect. The atmosphere is thick with anger and wounded pride. The first night your cell mate looks at you - grinning like a predator - and you snap her toothbrush in half, holding the sharp pieces in your fists and saying nothing.  
"You been somewhere bad, girl?" She asks with a long drawl, that look she'd had before gone like it was never there.  
You say nothing - Is there anywhere good? - and start rubbing the edges of your own toothbrush against the concrete. It seems prudent to have something sharp on you.  
  
You don't know anything about prison politics. Hell, all you know about _prisons_ is don't drop the soap and whatever else you've gleaned from a couple of episodes of OZ. i.e Not a whole damned lot. But what you have learnt is that the man five cells down from you runs most of this cell block. You stay out of the three cell radius and avoid the hell out of anyone who looks like they come from that area. There is no way you want to be mixed up in whatever mundane powerplay grab bullshit these guys seem to like.  
  
Your cell mate has Texas printed on her name strip and she doesn't offer any other. She's stand-offish, almost cold and doesn't seem to have affiliations with anyone. And yet, despite her lack of comrades and more importantly and show of strength from her, her cell is nicely situated, close enough to the people who seem to be running the joint, but far enough away that their politics don't spill over in front of her. You file that interesting tidbit of information away in the back of your mind, right along side the bit where, despite the fact that she seems determined to have nothing to do with you, she hasn't kicked you from the cell or bothered you, and occasionally gives you advice when you're _faux-pas_ ing your way through the prison system.  
  
It takes you five days to realise that Maria is in the same prison. It's only chance that you see her, sitting in the food hall. She's quiet and has her head bowed talking low to a Hispanic man who would only look big next to her. You slide in the empty seat opposite them. The man looks up with a hard glare and Maria looks up with a frown. Then she just looks confused.  
_Hi_ , you mouth, lifting your hand up in a half hearted wave; you're not sure how she's going to react to you.  
"Oh my god!" She honest to god _squeals_ and throws her arms around you. It's an awkward hug, the table edge digging into your ribs, her arms squeezing to tightly, and your hands hesitantly patting her back.  
"Hey," You say, your voice still doesn't sound quite right but it's not overly noticeable.  
"How'd you get here? When? What happened to you? Where's Carey?" She looks around while you bite at your bottom lip and look at the table surface.  
"Oh." She sounds sad, but sad like she's been expecting it. Somehow that's worse.  
"Jesus, you're so skinny, are you okay?"  
You nod, because really, what else can you do?  
  
The guy with her goes by - and you're not making this up and you totally giggled when he said it – El gato. If it weren't so ridiculous, you'd realise it suits him to a fucking T. He's very quiet, watches everything, and can switch from lazing to attacking in the blink of an eye. He's the sort of person that might have once scared you. He's also completely and utterly infatuated - _in love_ \- with Maria.  
  
  
There's this girl who is avoided by everyone. You notice this because you get this weird feeling when you look at her and you spend a lot of time watching people. It's not quite the feeling you get with Postals, but its something. So you watch her more carefully. Sometimes you think that maybe what you're best at; watching and not interacting at all. You think about talking to the loner girl, on one hand you're sufficiently intrigued to talk to her, on the other, is it really such a great idea to talk to someone so obviously ostracised?  
"E, hey E." You look around, only one person calls you E.  
"Texas?"  
"Don't go near her." Texas says in a low hard voice.  
"Wasn't going near no one." You retort, because you hadn't decided if you were or not. Texas leans on the wall near you, staring forwards, to outsiders it would just look like she was minding her own business and not talking to you at all. Sneaky talking. "What's so fucking bad about her?"  
"Talks to Postals." She says it like it makes perfect sense.  
"What?"  
"Jesus, you are retarded aren't you? The girl. She talks to Postals. Informs on the rest of us. Gives them information on us in exchange for stuff."  
"Really?" Surely no one would do that. Right? "People actually do that?"  
"Yeah, and she's good too. Stopped at least one breakout. And a riot."  
"Shit, why hasn't anyone done anything about it?"  
"Like what?" She turns her head, actually looks at you and you think she looks like she's calculating something in her head. "Look, I'm just giving you a friendly warning. Stay away from her. She'll backstab you for lipstick, or someone else will figure you're like her and you'll be watching your back for fricken ever."  
"Thanks? I guess, for the warning?"  
"Don't thank me." You roll your eyes as she walks off. Texas is so damned weird; aloof, cold and strangely caring.  
At first you decide to ignore the informing girl. Ignore and avoid like you do pretty much everyone else. But then you think _what the fuck am I doing_?  
The question literally flashes in your mind and you think if she was a Postal, you were both on a level playing field, you wouldn't be avoiding her, the bitch would be ten times dead by now. That thought sits heavy in your mind. It seems like the person who crawled out of that hole is a lot less forgiving than the Shannon that fell in to it.  
You rationalise it in your head. She's all but declared herself a Postal, aligning herself with them at the expense of the rest of you. That makes her a Postal as far as you're concerned. And you know how to deal with them.  
It's actually really simple, when you think about it, what you have to do. A fucking threat is just mingling amongst you and you can't ignore that. You wish you could say you felt a little bit bad about what you're planning to do, but it's a sound idea and you really just can’t get over the idea of someone fucking _choosing_ to help Postals. So you plan, and if you do it right, maybe the repercussions won't be too bad. For you specifically.  
The plan you form isn't perfect, there's holes and issues with details that you don't know and can't ask about without being excessively suspicious. You already think that Maria knows somethings up. She doesn't know what and you're not telling her. You thought about it, but you've gotten used to doing things alone and you just know that she wouldn't approve. She maybe quieter now, but you can see she still believes in the general goodness of people.  
A wonderfully improbable concept.

Not that you haven't seen goodness in people; you've known people who were good even in the shittiest of places. But you just tend to think those people were few and far between. In your experience, mankind on a whole was a race of self-serving bastards.  
You breathe deep and shove away those thoughts, what you're about to do requires your full attention and you definitely don't need to be distracting yourself with your bitter world view.  
The blaring horn that signals breakfast rings through the air.  
Now is the time for sharp plastic and quick actions.  
Adrenaline is pumping long before you see your target. It's weird how intoxicating the feeling of excitement mixed in with fear and apprehension is. The fact is, you kind of really love that heady mix of feelings, if you had the time you might wonder what that says about you.  
But no matter. You roll your shoulders, moving with the crowd towards the food hall. You slip between people, moving smoothly. You have to be quick, but you also have to be unnoticed. You have to time this well and aim it better.  
You can see the girl's back, she isn't more than a few feet in front of you. You put a lot of thought into how you'd do this, where you'd aim, but now you're wondering if you've chosen the best plan. You close your eyes, effortlessly slipping past another person, coming up right behind her. The plan relies on how smoothly you can do this, a fact that you realise may not have been the best idea.  
In theory you can do this, but the closest you've gotten to doing this before is with that Postal in Central Park, and back then you had a gun.

You really _really_ wish you had a gun.  
But you don't and wimping out on this won't get you one either.  
So you make your move. It's more of a sliding dance step that anything else; you slip around the girl, murmuring _sorry_ like you're some sort of polite commuter and palming your sharpened toothbrush. As you brush past you push it deep into her thigh, jerking it roughly sideways, up and out, and you don't even falter in your step. The swiftness, the fucking _shock_ of what you've done freezes her voice in her throat and you're six, seven people away by the time she stumbles and falls.  
Afterwards, when everyone’s been shoved back to their cells and the guards are dealing with the mess you made outside the food hall, you think it shouldn't have been so easy to kill another person. There's supposed to be morals and _feelings_ and shit that stops you. Instead you're scrubbing off the blood that’s spattered up your wrist and wondering how the hell you managed to not be completely drowned in blood; you've got a couple of spots on your pants and your sleeve is fairly covered, but a few moment under the cold water and it'll be almost unnoticeable. It's not like your clothes were that clean to start with.  
You keep expecting someone to drag you kicking and screaming and punish you for what you did. But there doesn't even seem to be much enthusiasm for looking into who killed her. Instead it goes away like the body, like it never was. You watch the guards for signs of _something_ but they don't even seem to care. You wonder if maybe they didn't like what she was doing anymore than you did.  
It's weird being having same moral stance as Postals.  
  
You have to admit, you're still waiting to feel some sort of guilt. It probably says nothing great about you that you don't really feel anything. You don't even feel particularly happy about what you did, it just seemed like something you were supposed to do, something that had nothing to do with wants.  
Maria has no neutral feelings on the matter; you don't think she saw the actual thing, but from the way Elgato is looking at you now, he definitely did. He looks at you like he's being playing with a something harmless only to discover it was really a bomb or something. Now _that_ makes you uncomfortable.  
  
"I wouldn't expect _la mujer muerta_ to understand."  
"What?"  
"Dead woman. The dead woman." Maria says, staring at her hands.  
Fuck, you can't even bring yourself to be offended by that. Perhaps he's right. Anyway, it's a better moniker than Girl E.  
  
"You ever think that maybe it's your fault?" Maria snarls at you one day.  
"What? What do you mean?"  
"Dave? Tom? Ellena? _Carey_? Remember them? They were alive before you were alone with them."  
Elgato starts making protesting noises, which you both promptly ignore. You don't think he's doing it to defend you anyway; more trying to make sure Maria doesn't say anything she will regret.  
"It seems like every time you go off with one of my friends, you come back fine and they don't come back at all."  
"They were my friends too." You say quietly.  
"Really?" She asks harshly "Really? Because, I gotta say, you don't seem to broken up about it. I saw what you did to that girl, do you even care about people?"  
"Of course I fucking do!" You snap back, feeling a stirring of anger, something you haven't really felt for a long time.  
"You know what? Maybe you were right back then, maybe you have fucking turned, and you just fucked it up. Maybe you are one of them."  
"Maybe you're a fucking bitch." You snarl through gritted teeth. You know arguing with Maria is stupid, just like you know that all this nastiness is probably her dealing with all the fucked uppedness that's happened. But, fuck it; you haven't exactly had a merry apocalypse either.  
"What?"  
"Maybe you should stop clinging on to people and pretending to be a helpless damsel in distress. Maybe if you were a fucking round to help, maybe all the shit that happened wouldn't have been so bad."  
"So you’re blaming me now? I'm not the one that started an argument in the middle of fucking Postal territory!"  
"Fuck you! She was a goddamned Postal! I told you something was fucking off about her, but do you trust your friend who knows what the fuck she's talking about? Nooo, let's trust in the good hearted nature of man, because that could possibly steer you wrong!"  
"You know what? Fuck it, I don't care. Maybe you're right, but fact is, you're bad fucking luck. Everyone fucking dies around you and I don’t wanna hang around that."  
"Fucking fine with me." You snap, standing up so fast your chair skitters backwards across the floor. "Enjoy your fucking Frosty Flakes."  
You stalk away, angry with her and berating yourself. How goddamned stupid is it to get into a goddamned fight with you BFF in the middle of Infection Prison? Definitely not the smartest idea you've had. _Idiot_.  
  
So you avoid each other, which is easier said than done when you're trapped in a prison. But still, you do a pretty admirable job of ignoring those two. Elgato actually tries to talk to you but you look at him with a flat look and from the scowl that Maria gives him, he probably won't try again for a while. You know you're being childish, just like you know she didn't mean what she said, not really. But knowing doesn't change the anger that swells in your chest and makes your throat constrict. The only good thing about your anger is that it makes people duck out of your way. Somehow in the hierarchy of prison you've been bumped higher by getting into a shouting match with two long-term prisoners.  
But the anger doesn't last, quickly exhaustion and _tiredness_ takes it's place and you sleep walk through the days. More and more time passes without your notice and you just forget to worry about those feelings and things you see; just ignore the warnings that set your teeth on edge, just close your eyes to the shadows and sleep away the uneasy feelings. Maybe eventually you'll feel the desire to resurface into the land of the living, but right now your content to just pretend to not exist for awhile.  
You're so busy not existing that you don't notice that weird feeling settling in your guts straight away. When you do notice it, you wonder how long it'd been there and how the hell you've missed it. If there's one thing you should've learnt by now, it should've been to not ignore that feeling.  
It's not the nauseating, uneasy feeling you get with Postal related troubles, which gives you pause and makes you wonder what the hell is causing it. There's dark shadows all over this prison, it's no where as bad as the death camp, but still, death sits almost as heavily here, and you haven't noticed any sort of activity from your psychosis.  
Whatever it is, it's coming soon. Despite the time you've spent here, you don't know anything about prison politics. Maybe it's going to be a riot, or a jailbreak, or, well, fuck, you just _don't know_.  
You feel like someone's thrown cold water on you, reached the point where it has you jumping at every movement and you figure you have to do _something_ because nothing just isn't cutting it anymore. So you swallow your pride and walk with a ducked head towards Elgato and Maria.  
Maria stands angrily as she sees you approaching and that's when you realise what's going to happen has changed from a future possibility to a _right fucking now_. Another prisoner comes up behind and slams a chair into the side of Maria's head.  
Now, you don't know what the fuck happened before you got here. There's a lot of things you'll never know, never even ask about, but it's obvious that the two of them have pissed some of the inmates right off. For just a moment, a space of time so short it can't be measured, you think about walking away. You don't like that thoughts like that occur in your mind. So instead, you shove down the burning of shame that says _you’re a bad goddamned person_ and walk forward. You don't know what this is all about, but to hell with anyone that think you'll stand by while your friends are being beat.  
You slip your toothbrush from your pocket - when you leave here, you think, you're going to carry a big fuck off knife and no one will ever fuck with you - and walk up to the man whose coming in behind Elgato, ramming the sharp plastic home. He grunts as you pull it out of his back and shove it back in. You don't know how much hurt you have to inflict before they don't come back up. You've never even really been in a hand to hand fight. Not since that Postal in the forest and that can't really count because you had a gun back then.  
So you pull your shank free and shove him to the side, in time to see Maria trying to stand up and being hit again. Elgato is trying to kick at the guy but someone grabs his leg and they both tumble to the ground with the sickening crack of a bone breaking.  
You try to get to them, moving through bodies that are half trying to get out of the way, half trying to sort their own bullshit agendas in the confusion. Something burns deep in your back and you turn, wildly stabbing even though the movement makes a horrible keening noise come from your throat. You connect with a skinny kid with bloody hands and a surprised face. You can't tell if he's surprised that he stabbed you, or surprised that he got stabbed; but as your shank digs deep in his belly you can't bring yourself to give a damn. If you're going to try to get fame and status by stabbing people you better be prepared for the fucking retaliation.  
You fall to your knees, pain throbs in time to your heartbeat and you slide to the floor.  
Guards are coming, maybe not rushing as fast as they could be, but still they want you guys for experiments and forced infections, not for you to kill amongst yourselves. You can hear their booted feet on the hard ground, vibrations against your ear. Your back hurts so fucking much and you almost think _maybe today_. But you don't. Instead you just grit your teeth and hang onto the _hurt_ of consciousness for as long as you can.  
  
You spend the next couple of days busy dropping in and out of consciousness, convinced you're dying of shock or infection or both. If you survive this, you think as you try to swallow and wish for some water, you swear you're never going to put yourself in a position where your ignorance leads you to this - sick, wounded, _vulnerable_ \- again.  
  
The next day is when you finally open your eyes, lucid and clear-headed. Elgato's playing cards with Texas, his leg – plaster cast from ankle to above his knee - propped up beside you on the bed. It seems so mundane and yet so very unlikely that you wonder if you're still gripped in the throes of a fever dream. But your head feels clear, and the rest of you feels like tissue paper; which is a marked change from the previous days of feeling like a drunk immortal convinced you could totally run a marathon if you were so inclined, and could get up off the bed. You probably could've too, with fever mad determination, even though after you would likely have keeled over dead.  
So without the excuse of hallucinations, you're forced to take Maria's boyfriend and your anti-social cell mate playing cards whilst locked in a cell with you as Actually Really Happening.  
They're talking - almost _bantering_ \- with each other and you wonder if you've entered some sort of twilight zone where angry Latinos gossip with angry Texan girls.  
"I'm a little surprised you didn't kick her out the moment she got assigned to your cell." Elgato says staring intently at his cards.  
"Naah, we bonded over a mutual hate of dental hygiene."  
"What does that even mean, man?"  
"She came in and snapped my toothbrush in half."  
"Shit that would've just pissed me off. "  
"Actually it was sorta bad ass." Texas says in a voice that says she was surprised that she wasn't pissed off too. "She is a very intense kind of person isn't she?"  
"Wouldn't know." Elgato mutters into his cards.  
"She's seen some shit. I can tell you that much."  
"Haven't we all?" Elgato retorts back sharply.  
Texas makes a _Mmmm?_ noise in the back of her throat.  
"Yeah, but I don't really get the 'Boohoo, it's the end of the world' vibe from her. It's more of a 'fuck me over and I'll end the world a little more'. Hell, she'd probably enjoy it."  
"You have spent way too much thinking about that."  
"All them sleepless nights thinking she was gonna shiv me if I fell asleep."  
You seem to recall thinking it was _her_ that was going to shiv _you_.  
"Her? Really?" He's disbelieving, you're a little insulted.  
"Oh yeah, bitch has crazy eyes." Texas says, laughing then sobers up and says. "Have you seen the way the guards watch her? Like they think she's dangerous, but they can't figure out how."  
"See, when I first saw her, I thought, thus girl, she looks like a little kicked puppy. All quiet and trying not to be noticed and shit. The she goes and takes out that fucking girl, you know the one that was trading information with the Postals?"  
Texas nods.  
"Fuck it happened fast. She just walked past her easy as you please and BAM!" He claps his hands loudly together for added effect. "The girl goes down, and she's walking off and no one knows what the fuck's going on. Mar didn't like that but, _damn_ , I thought, having someone like that as your _familia_? Christmas come early, baby."  
"You do realise she still got stabbed in the back by some punk ass kid?"  
"But she didn't have to, man. She coulda just baled. Wasn't like we was friendly at that time. And anyway, that little _pendejo_ ain't around no more is he?"  
"Now _that_ I did see. I liked how she snuck up behind the guy sneaking up behind you. It was like a comedy, but, you know, one that ended with graphic disembowelling. Very impressive, even if it ended icky."  
"You could've helped you know."  
"Hey, she's my cel lmate, not my ' _familia_ ' or whatever. I worked out a long time ago that I'm the only one I can trust."  
"Oh that's so sad." Elgato says, sarcastic and rolling his eyes. "I can't help but notice that you haven't kicked us out of here, though."  
"Okay, Just cos I'm not overly friendly, I _am_ still a human fricken being. Besides, you're probably carrying something pointy." She grins, Elgato's returning grin says she is not fucking wrong.  
"Don't see much point in starting a fight over nothing." She shrugs. "And anyway, people know I'm neutral, or, well, what's the word for hates on every side?"  
"Double agent?  
"Fuck you, you cheeky bastard." She says, throwing a card down and you're beginning to think that they aren't really trying to play.  
Elgato looks up at you, notices you staring blankly at them and straightens up from his slouch.  
"Hey."  
You close your eyes and scrunch your face up then stretch. There's a deep ache in your back but it doesn't feel as bad as you expected it too. You open your eyes back up.  
"Hey."  
"Want some water?"  
You nod and stare at the two of them as they navigate their way around the cell, the level of familiarity between the two is weird.  
"Where's Maria?" You ask as you sip on the water.  
Elgato looks down at his hands.  
"She's in the Halls." Texas answers. You stare at her. The _Halls?_ The fucking _Infection_ Halls? She got her head smashed in, not fucking infected.

"She's in a coma or some shit, so they stuck her in there."  
A coma? _Jesus, fuck_. You don't even know what to think about that.  
"Is she? How?" You don't know what you want to ask. _Is she okay?_ She's in a fucking coma; so probably not.  
"We haven't seen her." Elgato says angrily and really what the fuck is going on?  
"They only let the Sickness Orderlies into the Halls," Texas explains. "We've got one that comes and gives us updates, but, well, they ain't really welcome in mainstream prison land."  
You close your eyes and let sleep come crashing back.

  
"You don't talk much, do you?" Elgato says out of the fucking blue and silence seems the most eloquent way to answer him. You look at your cards, you don't even know the rules for poker and yet they keep roping you into playing. So you copy their movements and for wonder don't actually lose every hand.  
"No, she's thinking deep thoughts." Texas says leaning forward, sneaking a look at your cards.  
"Got nothing to say." You mutter as you scowl at Texas and curl your cards out of her sight.  
" _Deep_ thoughts." Texas drawls, leaning back again; cheating attempt foiled for the moment.  
You haven't really learnt why Elgato now shares a cell built for two, nor why you're locked up at random times; but you're putting two and two together and getting a fairly clear four. You figure Elgato's lost the cell he used to share with Maria; with only one working leg and Maria not around, he's not really in the position to be fighting for a piece of property. As for the lockdowns, you occasionally hear Texas and Elgato mention a riot, so you figure the lockdowns are sort of a punishment for whatever happened after you went down.

The idea that you were inadvertently a part of starting a riot is kind of cool.  
  
The Sickness Orderly who visits is pale and sweating; you wonder if he's infected, how long he's got before someone has to take his place. That’s why they're not welcome and no one really volunteers for Orderly duty, the risk of infection is high even when you’re not tending to the needs of the sick.

You sometimes wonder if you were lucky to not get sick when you were looking after Carey and Maria. You're pretty sure you _should_ have gotten sick, hell some people got sick more than once.  
Elgato doesn't like being around him; despite the orderly's little facemask, Elgato swears and goes white around the mouth whenever he sees him coming. You don't know why he feels like that, but you have your theories. The infection hit harder in some places, after a person had seen hundreds of people fade away to death or wake up Postal, they tended to freak the fuck out at first sign of sickness. Even Texas is cooler than usual when the Orderly is around.  
When the news that Maria's woken up comes to your cell, Elgato crumples onto the bed, head between his knees. You can almost see him trying to psych himself up to do the one thing that will allow him to see Maria. You watch him and realise this is probably something that you can do. You don't really believe you're immortal or fucking immune or whatever the fuck, but you don't care about infection and the thought of seeing the Infection Halls, which you've only heard whispers about, is actually quite exciting. But maybe that's thoughts about what that says about your mental condition best left for another day. Here, now, you place your palm lightly on El's head. His hair is short, spiky and rough; it's weird touching another person on purpose, you haven't done it in so long.  
"Only one of us needs to go," You say the words quietly. "And you can't walk properly."  
It's an excuse, but as excuses go, it's a fairly believable one.  
  
It's easy to volunteer for Orderly duty. They give you a pair of white scrubs and you follow the line of pale Orderlies to the other end of the Prison complex.  
The Infection Halls.  
_Holy shit_  
Bed after bed after bed. For the entire length of the room. And it's the same for many more rooms. The scale of this place beggars belief.  
Once in the Halls you're largely unsupervised, the doors are all locked, the windows barred, it's not like there’s any way out, so you guess they've decided to let you be. Maybe they don't much like what they're doing here either. And that there is an interesting thought.  
It's been so long since you've really seen the black shadows that were commonplace back at the camp. Here in the Halls, it's almost dizzyingly full of black shapes. You still don't really know what you're seeing - _what the hell they are -_ but you're pretty sure that them being here is not a good thing.  
  
One of the Orderlies takes you to Maria. She's propped up, has half her face covered in a bandage and is as pale as death. She blinks at you, squinting as if she's not trusting what she's seeing.  
"Hey," You say quietly, dropping to your knees beside her bed.  
Her mouth opens and closes then she raises a hand and maybe mouths _hey_.  
"You okay?" It's a stupid question, you know that before you ask it, but still what else can you say?  
She doesn't answer, just looks at you with sad eyes. Then she closes them and frowns like her head hurts.  
" _Sorry_." She says the word oddly - almost without inflection - it sounds like she's repeating a word that she's heard but doesn't know the meaning of.  
"Hey, it's okay, friends are supposed to fight you know." You grin at her and she smiles weakly back.  
You try talking some more but her eyes droop closed and you end up sitting on her bedside wondering how you got here. It feels surreal, being in a hospital like setting, surrounded by dying people. You wonder off hand what they do with the bodies. That thought makes you wonder if there's a death camp nearby, dealing with the cast offs. Must be a busy business, trying to turn every survivor.  
Sometimes you wonder if you were really thinking when you volunteered for this. Not only do you have to deal with the idea that at least fifty per cent of these people are going to die, regardless of what you do. You're also risking infection by being around these people, breathing this air and generally exposing yourself to all of this.  
And if all that isn't enough to make you fret your nights away sleeplessly, the thought that a lot of these people are going to wake up Postal weighs heavy on your mind. One sharpened toothbrush is not going to be overly effective against a homicidal new Postal.  
An Orderly drags you off to help her change sheets in an empty hall. She says that they'll soon be filled and you wonder what percentage of the previous occupants died. The thought doesn't even really bother you that much anymore, you feel a little sick that your main thought is _At least it's not me that has to burn and bury them_.  
As you lose yourself in the repetitive actions of flipping sheets the Orderly with you tells you about Maria. She says that somethings broken in her head, says that she doesn't seem able to speak properly, says that she probably won't ever get better.  
You shake your head and stop listening to her. Of course Maria would get better. She just had a bump to the head.  
But you learn very quickly that Maria isn't as well as she appears. She's unsteady on her feet, her balance is shot to hell and scarier is that sometimes she gets confused about what's happening. Almost like she's forgotten all that's happened. You try to explain it to Elgato, but you're not sure what to say, _how_ to explain it. It's like she understands everything you're saying, but can't find the words to talk back.  
"Do you remember what happened?" You ask her quietly, one afternoon. She looks at you, and then her eyes unfocus as she searches through her memories. She nods, then frowns, struggling to find the words she should know. Finally she places the point of her index finger against the swollen mess that is the side of her head.  
"Bam." She says in a serious voice, then taps her finger against the wound. "Bam." She says the word again even as she winces at the contact.  
And, yeah, that pretty much sums it up.  
  
Just thinking about it hurts your head and frustration of the whole fucking situation makes something aches inside your chest. You honestly can't fix this, instead you just hope that with time and patience she'll get better  
And she does get better. Sort of. She still has trouble speaking, she growls single words and slams her fists against things as she tries to communicate with what she's got left. But she's steadier on her feet, and soon the guards let her out to eat with the rest of the prison population. You think Elgato's going to fucking explode with happiness when he sees her walk out the first time. She got stitches along her temple and halfway down her cheek but he touches her gently, like she's the most precious thing in the world.  
You wonder how much it must hurt to care for someone that much and resolve to never let the two of them deal with this shit again.  
Now you've volunteered for Orderly duty you can't just quit, no matter how much you really _really_ want to. No matter how many times you see a Postal wake up so suddenly that none of the guards reach them in time. It seems a little unfair that volunteering to look after the sick means you're likely to get slaughtered by one of them.  
You make a decision to not fucking mope about how you're stuck here - now is the time for positive fucking thinking, you've already had your moment of giving up and that just wasn't working for you anymore.  
So instead you start watching the shadows. Start trying to work out why they hover over some people, why they seem to crowd around others. It's something you can't really talk about with anyone.  
_Oh by the way, I can tell when people are Postals, yeah, it’s because these shadows I see - which I'm beginning to think is actually_ _maybe_ _death - follow them around_.  
Yeeah.

That's never going to go down well. But still, the more you watch them the more you realise you can tell the people that are going to wake up Postal. At first you don't do anything. You can't be sure that you're not batshit insane - a diagnosis that you probably wouldn't deny if someone threw it in your direction - and there's still no way of proving that you're anything but a good guesser. So you keep a tally, mentally mark the ones that you're sure are going to turn, then watch to see if you're wrong or right. Turns out you're right.  
_Every fucking time_.  
So with that piece of confidence you decide to slow down the rapidly growing Postal population. The first one you do in plain view of the room. You've learnt that if you act like you're supposed to be doing what you're doing, people rarely bother you; so when you play with his IV, not questions you. Putting an air bubble in the tube isn't exactly rocket science. As you walk away one of the Orderlies catches your eye; from the look she gives you, you can tell she saw exactly what you did. Even though you loathe looking people in the eye you refuse to be the one to break eye contact first and finally she looks down and walks away as swiftly as she can.  
As the body jerks slightly and stills you stand over him, wonder who he was, wonder how he got here and whisper a _sorry_ for the guy he wasn't anymore.  
Days later she comes to you; eyes lowered, hands nervously clenched together.  
"Since you started," She pauses, staring very hard at the ground. "Since you started working here there have been significantly less Postals waking up."  
You don't say anything, if she was going to report you, surely she wouldn't be coming to you first.  
"How," She looks up, her quiet voice pausing. "How are you doing it?"  
"I'm not doing anything." You say even though you desperately want to tell someone what you're doing; get some sort of 'yes, you're doing the right thing' or maybe just an 'I understand.'  
She stares at you and you wonder how you'll react if she calls you a murderer. You like to think you'd not do anything stupid, but these days you're not that sure how you're ever going to react. Besides, maybe she'd be right, maybe that's exactly what you are.  
Instead the Orderly just gives you a watered down smile and walks away; the soles of her shoes click loudly on the hard floor in the otherwise silent room. And that seems to be that. You look at the beds, at the people in them, and wonder what the hell you're doing here.  
In a way you become something of an Angel of Death. The other Orderlies avoid you like you're worse than the Postals guarding you all, but that don’t really bother you that much. In a way, you guess, you're setting the sick free before they can turn into the very thing that technically killed them. And you also know exactly how psycho that sounds. You figure as long as you keep remembering that, maybe you'll be okay. Not great, but okay.  
You keep expecting one of the Postal guards to notice what you've doing, but it seems like they can't tell which of the Infected will turn either. It feels weird getting away with murder right under their noses. Weird but oddly satisfying.  
  
"Whaaat?" Maria asks, drawling the word out like it's physically torturous for her, and frowns; aggravated. She's been getting more and more frustrated as time keeps passing and the difficulty she has saying words hasn't eased. You get where she's coming from, really you do, but considering the abuse her head and brain took, a difficulty in speaking and slight confusion has to be no close to a miracle; especially when you considered the level - or lack - of care she got after it happened.  
Still, she swears up a storm in her mind, you can tell she's swearing because Maria's face is nothing if not expressive; and you just hope for some sort of breakthrough. For her blood pressure if nothing else.  
"Hola, mi corazone. Como estas hermosa?" Elgato says as he leans over to kiss the top of her head.  
"Jag är så illa som jag förväntade mig,du fåne." She answers grumpily, crossing her arms and glaring around the room.  
You stare and glance at El; _tell me I didn't just imagine that_. His expression is almost identical to yours, hesistantly he asks.  
"Mami puedes decirme quien es el presidente?"  
"Det finns ingen president, fåne."  
His face falls, "It's just gibberish."  
"No," You say, actually feeling excited for the first time in you don't know how long. "That's Swedish. She just called you an idiot in Swedish."  
"How can you tell?"  
"Trust me, I got called an idiot by a Swedish girl for weeks when this first started."  
"How does she know Swedish?"  
"Maria knows like bits of many _many_ languages. How do you not know this?"  
"She told me she like languages, I just presumed that she meant she just knew Spanish."  
"Skulle du sluta prata om mig!?"  
"Lo siento, Mar."  
"Can you do English?" You cut in over Elgato's apologies. She frowns, thinking, then shakes her head.  
"нет, Христос говорить сложно. это странно, это странно да ?"  
You smile, even though you're disappointed. This, you think, definitely qualifies as a major breakthrough.  
  
"Something is going to happen." You announce over breakfast. Maria looks at you and says nothing. Elgato eyeballs you with an interested look. You don't have that strange uneasy feeling you usually get when the Something about to happen is Postal fuelled. So it's going to be one of you that start it. And soon. You can feel the phantom grip on your shoulder getting stronger as time ticks by, so - if you're reading it right - that means whatever is going to happen is going to happen sooner rather than later.  
"Bad or worse?" Elgato asks quietly with a significant look at the livid red indent on Maria's face.  
"Worse." It feels worse, you think, even though the idea of _worse_ seems unfathomable.  
"Us or them?" He asks while discreetly watching the guards saunter around.  
"Us, feels like it'll be us."  
"Okay, what do we do?" He asks and you feel an overwhelming rush of gratitude that he doesn't question your feelings. Somehow you and Elgato work really well together. You don't know if it's an any port in a storm sort of thing, or if it's just the two of you finding common ground in being overprotective assholes around Maria. Whatever the reasons, it's unbelievably awesome to have someone you can trust to react to something you say without pausing to ask how you know shit you shouldn't.  
"Be ready." You don't know what for, can't give him any real, hard information, but he nods anyway, nods like he's taking every word you say very seriously. Maria gives you a smug look that says _told you, he's awesome_ and you flip her off. "I'm gonna go talk to Texas."  
"Why? She won't believe you."  
"Not about getting her to believe me; just want to give her some warning."  
"Whatever man," El says raising a palm in defeat. "Just don't be surprised when she laughs in your face."  
  
You find Texas in your cell and you figure it's the best place for a fairly private conversation.  
"Something is bad going to happen." You think it worked so well with Elgato and Maria that maybe it'll have a shot of working with Texas.  
"Oh really?" She asks, and you can tell form her tone, it was _not_ working. So you go with what you do best. Intense and to the point.  
"Shut up. Something's going to happen. It's going to be bad. This is get out now time. We're going and I think you should come with us."  
"Leaving alone the question of _how_ you would even get out, why would I want to come with you? Lone wolf remember?"  
"Something really bad is going to happen, and it'll be worse than anything you've ever seen."  
"Okay, One. How could you possibly know if something that bad was going to happen? And two. You have no idea what bad shit I've seen."

Shit, all you seem to be doing is putting Texas' back up, _fuck it_ , the only direction is forwards.  
"I'm not getting into a goddamned _woe is me_ competition. I'm just giving you a fair fucking warning, just like you gave me."  
"How would you even-" She cuts off when you give her a flat stare. You're not going to explain something you can't explain. "Alright, then why are you asking me to come with you? I thought I've always made my stance on buddying up pretty damned clear."  
"This isn't about picking sides." The more you talk about this the more you realise how fucking bad this thing coming is. " When this goes down, the only side there’s gonna be is who survived it. Now you've been a friend,"  
"A friend? What even, E?" She interrupts but you carry on over her.  
"Whether you like it or not, you've been a friend. So I'm giving you some warning; don’t wait until it's too late to decide."  
"You know I'm not like your little group of friends, with the whole _caring_ for each other and stuff, right?"  
"That's fine by me, cos I’m not asking you to be my friend, I gotta enough of them. I'm asking you because you know how to handle yourself, you're useful and, more importantly, you know how to stay off the fucking radar."  
Texas rolls her eyes, making to leave; you grab her arm and force her to remain seated.  
"Now look, you got this sweet cell, you got some pretty fucking awesome gear here and yet no one bothers you."  
"Hey, I told you, I'm neutral." She protests.  
"Bullshit. Neutral means alone. Neutral means you got no one to watch your back. Neutral makes you a fucking target." She looks at you like she's never seen you before, and wonder why you're trying so hard to try and make your point. "So the fact that you're still here and you don't have any allies, either means you’re the luckiest son of a bitch in this prison, or you're such a scary motherfucker that no one wants to fuck with you."  
"Maybe I am just lucky." Texas says flippantly.  
"Fine by me, I'll team up with lady luck any fucking day." You snap; she frowns and looks at you, using that hard, penetrating stare that always makes you want to hide from sight.  
"I always forget it's the quiet ones I'm supposed to look out for."  
You let go of her arm and step back, suddenly feeling out of place and wrong footed.  
"Just think about it." You say as you stand up. "To be honest, I'll be fine either way."  
Then you leave her. No sense in pushing her any further; she'll either come or she won't. If nothing else she's been warned now, maybe when shit starts happening it'll be enough to give her a chance of getting out.  
  
  
As it turns out, you find out that you can convince people to divulge their secret plans simply by asking them. You have no idea when you got a reputation, but apparently you're an up and comer in the prison hierarchy. That thought is a little weird, but since it's useful you don't say anything to make them think that you're actually just muddling your way through all this.  
There's going to be a riot.  
It's funny how your Something Bads Gonna Happen feeling has morphed into a Must Get Out Now feeling. Suddenly you find yourself planning a jailbreak and, Jesus, what _even_? You know fucking _nothing_ about breaking out of jail. Five months ago, if someone had implied you'd be trying to break out of a prison in America you would've laughed your ass off and called it pure fantasy, and a _far-fetched_ fantasy at that. Now you’re trying to plan something without having a timeline or any experience and all you want to do is bash your head against a wall. You honestly thing it's so tempting to just say fuck it and don't bother. It can all end soon. Only you suck at doing nothing. You get _bored_ , and antsy and your skin itches. So you plan. And hope.  
  
It starts with an explosion. An _explosion_.  
No matter how much information you've gathered, not one of those fuckers mentioned explosives. _Shit_ The ground shakes and you figure, at least everyone's gonna be is confused as you. Hopefully? Elgato follows close behind you as you make your way down the halls and you really hope your rough plan works as well as they always seem to do in the movies; though preferably without the comical mishaps.  
Smoke is slowly filling the air and you wonder if all the booms have set something on fire. You ask El; he shrugs and mutters something about riots always seeming to involve fires.  
You hadn't really thought about that - a fucking _riot_ \- and, yeah, okay, you knew this was coming, but you missed the last riot due to the whole being unconscious thing, so all this is new to you. New and insanely scary.  
Now the explosions have seemingly stopped, _holy shit_ the whole place seems to be going insane, you can hear shouting and _noise_ coming from pretty much every direction but the one you're heading in. You hope that gives your plan a bit of credence. You desperately don't want to screw this up.  
Gunfire suddenly breaks through the noise and the noise almost has you dropping to the ground on instinct. _Jesus Christ_ , you haven't heard that noise _forever_. Not since _then_. That memory decides to surface and you stumble because _goddamn_ you didn't expect to have to ignore _that_ memory right now. You stumble again and this time you seem to be falling but a hand grabs at your elbow and hauls you back to your feet.  
"Thanks, El." You mutter without looking up. How fucking embarrassing.  
Then you realise it's not Elgato holding you arm.  
"Thanks Texas."  
"Don't fricken thank me." She snaps. "Move! What's your fricken plan? You better have a good fricken plan. Jesus Christ I can't believe I am doing this."  
You take that to mean she's coming with you.  
"Jesus, did you see it back there? Holy crap, E, when you're right, you are not wrong. Which way are we going anyway?"  
"The Halls." El answers and Texas stops.  
"Aww," And you can see her trying very hard not to turn around and leave; instead she snarls, " _Goddamn_."  
Then barges past to lead the way.  
"There a reason we're going to the worst place in the world?"  
"It's not the worst," You say lightly.  
"Oh, fine, whatever drama queen. It's not a fricken fantasy land of candy canes though is it?"  
You shrug, now is probably not the best time to say you've pretty much got used to halls of dying people.  
"So what are we doing in Infection Central?"  
"Escaping."  
"Yeah, because it's not at all super fortified." Texas says rolling her eyes.  
"No it is." You say. "But they take the ones that turn out another door, and through that door _is_ a fantasy land of candy canes. Or at least a fantasy land of not very fortified."  
"So you're leading us to Postals. Great fricken plan."  
You ignore her, you definitely don't tell her she might be right - everything rests on theory and guesswork right now - instead you knock sharply on the door.  
Maria's head pops up in the glass and she grins before letting you in.  
El automatically moves to her side.  
"Got the keys?"  
"Got!" She says dangling them up in the air for you all to see. "Fick dem från den dumaste personen."  
"Pequeña cosa inteligenteG." Elgato murmurs and you roll your eyes, you don't know _what_ he's saying, but you can feel the sappiness of it from a mile away.  
"Okay, okay, that's very patronisingly filled with love," Texas may be your favorite person ever. "But can we move this conversation to the room not filled with infected people?"  
Halfway across the hall your plan comes to a crashing halt as one of the sleeping sick wakes. In your defence, there is no way to plan for a waking Postal. You also have a shiv, which doesn't fill you with a whole lot of confidence. Texas ducks and rolls out of the way, moving quicker than anyone you've ever seen.  
You rush in, hoping that maybe you can take him out before he gets his bearings. The dull end of the your shiv bruises you palm as you jam it into his side and for a moment you think _maybe_. But the moment passes and his hand shoots out, wrapping around your throat and _you can't fucking breathe_.  
Wildly you punch out at where you stabbed him, the brittle plastic shattering as your fist hits it. He screams and shoves you backwards. You hear the sound of the back of your skull cracking on the ground and lay there unable to move as he crouches over you; his hands once again going for your throat. You try to shove at him, try to reach up to hit him but your head _aches_ and your arms won't move the way you want them too and black spots are throbbing in your eyesight in time your thundering heartbeat.  
Then suddenly you can _breathe_. You barely notice him fall side ways as you roll away, coughing and trying to force air into your lungs. _Jesus Christ_.  
The body beside you moves, pushing himself up off the floor. You don't have the energy to do anything but roll as far away as you can; which isn't very far you discover as your back slams into a metal bed leg. You draw in a ragged breath and try to make your brain fucking _work_ , but suddenly there's a loud clang and the Postal goes down. Maria stands over him, a heavy looking oxygen canister in her hands. She frowns at the Postal for a moment then swings the canister down; _hard_.  
Elgato helps you up as Maria swings her bludgeon over her shoulder and points a finger against her temple; a hard half smile on her face.  
"Bam."  
And that's that.  
  
Through the door half the wall is missing; you actually pause a moment to seriously wonder about the rooms structural integrity. Then you feel stupid for thinking about that right now, if the roof is going to fall on you, there's probably not a whole lot you could do about that.  
"Move, move." Texas mutters, pushing your shoulder and looking wildly around the room. "Wow it's _nice_ in Postal land. That's so not fair."  
You blink and actually look at the room, it _is_ nice. It also now has a nice view of the prison grounds and chain link fence.  
"Fuck yes." Elgato says while shoving at Texas to move and she growls angrily at him. "Hey, _puta_ , don't think I didn't see you back there, fucking running away and leaving us."  
"Whatever, Kitty." Texas flips her hair and ignores him.  
"We can't trust her, you saw what she did." Elgato snarls. "She don't even try to deny it."  
"Doesn't." Maria corrects.  
"Whatever. Shut up, I know it." Elgato scowls and Maria flashes a small smile; you wonder if you're missing some sort of inside joke.  
  
  
The fence is down all over the place and there’s a glow form the buildings that suggests fire. And _holy shit_ the scale of what’s going is off the fucking scales. It's no longer just a riot; it looks like someone else - from the outside - has joined in on the fun. You didn’t even know other people were out there, not ones that could actually do something like this. You wonder if its one of the factions, is this like an invasion or something? Only if it was, wouldn’t there be people? Like a lot of people? Instead every now and then you see single barely visible shapes silhouetted in the glow and the stuttering muzzle flashes of occasional gunfire. So not an army then; still the idea that there’s someone out there, _someone_ still fighting and that thought is like a ray of fucking sunshine burning through the fog of hopelessness that you've been wallowing in since you got shoved into this place. It fills you with an actual desire to _fight_ and god it feels fucking excellent.  
"Head for the fence," You whisper; you still don't know where all the Postals are, perhaps they're off fighting whoever’s attacked, perhaps they’re around here somewhere. "We get out and we don't fucking stop moving."  
"Holy shit!" Texas exclaims with a wide grin. "That's _people_!"  
Even Elgato gets over his dislike for Texas to grin with her.  
"Move, move!" You say a little louder, the sun goes dark and you look across the yard, the amount of smoke from the buildings is fucking half blocking the sun. _Jesus Christ_ one of the fucking cell blocks doesn't just have a fire in it, the actual fucking building is on fire. The whole fucking thing.  
"Fuck, fuck, fuck," Maria sounds like she’s praying as she follows your gaze to the cellblock.  
" _Dio_ , is that _our_ cells?" Elgato asks in a squeaky voice.  
Texas looks back, her face whitening and she starts to slow.  
"Don't look at it, don't even think about it, lets get the fuck out of here." You snap, because if nothing else you’ve learnt to shut down that horror filled _oh my god_ feeling, shove it down until it doesn’t really exist, and if you want to get out of here - _survive_ \- that’s exactly what you need to be doing right now.  
"Stop thinking and fucking run!" You yell, shoving hard at Texas' shoulder.  
You're beginning to think you’re not going to get anyone out of here, but then, _saving grace_ \- and later you'll laugh bitterly at yourself for calling it that - someone starts firing at you. Bullets kick up the dirt, clang on the metal and _thwump_ into the brickwork and everyone fucking moves.  
You hear Texas cry out as something knocks you off balance. But Elgato is behind you, keeps you upright and Maria's got her hand wrapped around Texas' wrist, pulling her along, and you reach the mangled mess of chain link fence together.


	5. Interlude (quiet pacing between acts)

  
Your shoulders sore and every time your arms swings you can feel dried blood pulling at the fabric of your shirt. It doesn't too feel that bad - not like being stabbed in prison to having a bullet clip the side of your skull - it's just a throbbing pain; yeah it hurts, but it won't kill you, certainly not today in any case. You'll get someone to look at it when you have time to stop. But for now you run until you can't run anymore, then you walk until your lungs complain and your throat is raw from panting. Tired and sweating, you walk until night is darkening the sky and you hit the outskirts of a small town. You all stop, staring at the outlines of the buildings and hearing no sounds except those of you all breathing hard.  
"First old model car I see, I am hot wiring and I am never going to walk again." Texas proclaims loudly, looking down on the town like it's a goldmine.  
"NOW _THAT_ I WOULD HELP YOU WITH." Maria says.  
"Should we go in?" You ask. It seems like you've walked for ages, but you're still close to the prison, the town could be occupied even if, from here, it looks like it could be abandoned.  
"So do we do this or what?" Elgato asks, rubbing his hands together.  
"We're going to die a horrible death if we don't have supplies." Texas announces, her eyes lit with glee at the idea of looting.  
"So, bare necessities, then we make a run for the border." El decides. "That sound good to everyone?"  
"I want some chocolate. And I want some soda. If I don't get a coke I am going to punch someone in the cock." Texas declares, looking pointedly at the only man in the group.   
Chocolate and cola sounds good, you think.  
"I want a gun." You say the words, and then wince inwardly at how it probably sounds. But no one looks at you like you're a violence wanting freak. Texas actually nods, murmuring _Frick yeah_ , and Maria puts her thumbs up and grins at you.

 _My how the times have changed._   
The town does look pretty deserted, which is promising, but you all still approach it as quietly and unnoticed as you possibly can. The place reminds you so much of Manhattan that you consider turning around and getting the hell out of there. It's not so much in looks - this is the sort of place where a third story is considered extravagant - but there’s that same odd deserted with the feeling of being watched sensation that hangs heavy in the air. You resolve to be alert and aware, because you can’t just back off and go find another town to loot. There might not be any close or, worse, you might not even make it much further if you don't get supplies soon, it's not like the prison was the lands of plentiful.   
"Everyone keep your eyes open." You warn and Elgato eyes you, silently questioning your words.   
"Doesn't feel quite right." You say quietly, ducking your head as everyone looks at you.  
"You heard the lady, eyes open!" Texas says, breaking the awkward silence.  
You take the first street with your heart in your throat; you're convinced that any minute you're all going to be attacked - captured or killed - and it will be all your fault for not walking away.   
One of the houses has an actual white picket fence. You suppose once it looked really nice and homey, but now it’s dirty and half ripped up out of the ground. You consider it as you walk past, maybe with something solid in your hands you won't feel so fucking vulnerable out here. So you twist a single picket from the fence, and pull it free. It's flimsy, a poorly kept wood, and will probably shatter if it were to connect with someone's head, but at least _now_ you have something to swing at someone's head. You swing it over your shoulder and grin at the others. They stare for a moment longer then comically shrug in a synchronised movement.

 _God_ , they've all spent too long with each other if they're already starting to move the same.  
If there is anyone in the town, they're hidden really fucking well, because it certainly looks empty and evacuated. There's some rusty water left in the pipes and not much else.  
In the supermarket most of the shelves are covered in dust and what's left of the shop's inventory is mostly scattered across the aisles.  
"I know it seems like the end of the world for us, but I wonder if this is the beginning for them." Texas says as she stands over the dusty cash register, she looks exceptionally morose as she taps idly at the buttons.  
You think about that and you wonder if this is how humans took over from whatever you evolved from. If it was, you bet they fucking hated you.  
You toss her one of the candy bars stacked beside the gossip magazines and lean against the counter. A beam of light shines up on the ceiling and you hear Elgato proclaim proudly.  
"I have a flashlight!" The light goes out and after a moment of plastic tapping against something hard and swearing, the light flickers back on with a slightly duller beam. "Sort of!"  
"Flannel!" Maria shouts from another aisle and Elgato laughs and calls out to her.  
"Oh babe, I have _always_ wanted to hook up with a flannel wearing hick from Alabama."  
"сука хочу, чтобы твоя девушка была похожа на меня!" Maria retorts.  
From the way he laughs and she shriek-giggles you figure their verbal sparring ended in a draw.  
"I suppose we should change out of our prison blues," Texas sighs. "Nothing says 'escaped con' like running around in the uniform."  
You unwrap a chocolate bar for yourself; the chocolate has gone a little white from age, but it's been so long since you’ve eaten chocolate that it tastes fucking divine.  
"I kinda like what I'm wearing." You say, because your scrubs are actually quite comfortable.  
"Yeah, E, because once-was-white is really complimented by the bloody red running down your back."   
You try to look over your shoulder to see where it's hurt. The moonlight isn't particularly illuminating and the angle is all wrong but you can just see a dark patch on the dirty white.  
"Might get you to have a look at it." You say, still trying to twist to get a better glimpse. "Maybe after I can look at whatever's got you hunched over."  
Texas' face drops to a flat glare. "I'm fine."  
You look at her; she's sweating and her skin is a sickly shade of grey. You don't say anything but look pointedly at her hands, shaking with minuscule tremors. It reminds you of a rabbit you once, caught up in a trap; it had shook like that, shock making it tremble with frightened eyes. That rabbit hadn't exactly gone on to live long and prosperously after that.  
Texas sighs, annoyed. "Fine, okay, just keep it between us two, okay?"  
You give a noncommittal half shrug, you sure as hell aren't promising something like that. You shove off the counter and start wondering down the aisles.  
You pick up some clothes from Maria's aisle and a tine penlight from Elgato's, then wander to where the manchester is stocked with Texas trailing behind you.  
"Where the fuck have those two gone? Texas demands. "I swear to god, if we walk in on them having Just Broke Out Of Prison slash I've Got A Flashlight And You're Wearing Flannel sex, I'm going to throw up. Is it even legal with her like she is?"   
You frown at her, Maria might have difficulty _talking_ , but she was still completely capable of kicking ass if she didn't want to do something. Anyway, by now you figure they've managed to get into the back storerooms and are finding some privacy there. You don't blame them, it's not like you got any privacy in a prison. Hell, you might even high five them both when they resurface.  
You shrug and start ripping a sheet to use as bandages.  
"No, no!" Texas pipes up. "Get the ones with Edward on them! God I've wanted to destroy them ever since I discovered they existed."  
"Who?" Texas points to a set of sheets with a moodily staring boy printed on them.  
"Those ones?" The boy looks vaguely familiar, but you don't really get what’s the big deal.  
"Yeah."  
"Hey, this is that Twilight thing isn't it?"  
"Yeah, how do you not know that?"  
"Just never got around to reading or seeing it." You don't say that your little sister used to go on and on about it and by virtue of her passion for you purposefully blanked out anything to do with it.  
"Jesus Christ, I don't know whether to be sad that you've somehow managed to miss a global phenomenon, or insanely jealous that you've managed to miss _this_ global phenomenon." She looks up at the ceiling. "Weird, but whatever, we're still using them. I want to bleed all over Pouty's face."  
"That is so very wrong." You mutter as you pick up the new sheets.  
"Hey!" She calls out defensively. "He's a vampire - supposedly - I can make him love it."  
She pats her hands on the display bed.  
"Come sit by me." She says in the worst _come hither_ voice you've ever heard. "Okay, but before you take your shirt off, I feel like I should warn you that I may have promised myself that I'd get to perv on your boobs before I died. Just so you know all this niceness of mine does have an ulterior motive."   
You roll your eyes and unbutton your shirt.  
As it turns out you have a half centimetre deep furrow up your shoulder.   
"You live a charmed life." Texas proclaims, following the wound with her finger so you can feel how long it is. "An inch to the left and the bullet would've skimmed right up into the back of your skull."  
You don't say anything, the mental image she's just given you plays in your mind.   
"You didn't get this by choice did you?" She asks as her hand slips around and touches the ink stained into your skin. You still at her touch, uncomfortable with her scrutiny. "See I can tell, because you're always rubbing it and I swear every time you see it, you frown, like the biggest frown. What's it mean?"  
"Nothing." You mumble and hope she'll just drop the topic.  
"Where'd you get it? They didn't mark us in the prison, but I hear there are other places. Worse places." She keeps picking at the subject, fingers pressing hard against your chest. It feels like a scab she just can't stop picking at. You growl wordlessly and stand up so abruptly that Texas is shoved backwards.  
"Sorry." You snap and as you button up your shirt, you wonder if it counts as an apology if you say it like that.  
She shrugs.  
"My bad, I pushed." She says; you glance back her, her arms curled around her stomach, and feel a twinge of guilt.   
"Your turn." She makes like she’s going to beg off but you manhandle her with little sympathy. You'd think she of all people would get that there are some things you don't talk about.   
"What’s the verdict doc?" She says with a dark laugh.  
It doesn't look good. The blood's dark and is still oozing out. You don't think you can fix this.  
"Yeah, I'm pretty much screwed." She says, starting to cover it up again.   
"We'll fix it," You say as you pull her hands away and start mopping blood away. "When we find people, they'll fix it up proper."  
"Whatever you say, Pollyanna." She rolls her eyes and you think for someone with a hole in their gut, she's being a major pain in the ass.  
As you work, cleaning it up and packing shredded sheets against it, she stares at the top of your head and you can almost hear her thinking.  
"What?" You ask tersely, the staring getting on your nerves.  
"I don't know if I want to meet more people."  
"What? Why?"  
"People aren't generally good, you know." She says in a small voice and it’s the first time you've ever heard her sound vulnerable. Then she puts on a fake bright voice. "So I guess it's a good thing that I'm dying."  
"You'll be fine." You say and hope you're not lying.   
"You know I always kind of hoped that if I had to get shot, it'd be while I was doing something awesome; like saving someone or something." She sighs, and you're pretty sure she figures you were lying about being fine. "I guess it makes a shitty kind of sense that I’d get fucked up trying to save myself. No one dies saving people in real life. Especially not people like me."  
You don't know what to say to that, don't know if there is a way to answer that.  
"It's okay," She says, pulling her shirt down over the bandage and shrugging her jacket back on. "It's just the way the world works out."  
You try to say something - _anything_ \- that will sound comforting and, well, you're not sure what sentiment you're looking for, it's not like words can make anything better. Not words you know, anyway. But you're saved by the sounds of Maria and Elgato coming back from wherever they were.  
"Let's search some houses." Elgato suggests loudly when they come back into view, nodding at you. "Supergirl over there has me craving a weapon."  
Walking down the street you think about asking how you're supposed to find the magical house filled with _stuff_ , but Elgato seems so sure he knows what he's doing that it seems a little silly to question his bravado.  
Seemingly at random he decides on a house and smashes a window. The sound of glass tinkling on the floor is louder that you expected and has you looking around, expecting a light to suddenly come on and some old guy call you _goddamn punks_. It's funny how despite how long everything's being going on, you still expect old world reactions.  
"Déjame hacer uno." Maria pouts as she carefully brushes glass out of the away  
The house seems pretty boring, but you do score some bottled water in the fridge. It's room temperature and a little stale but tastes like the nectar of gods compared rusty pipe water.   
"Come on lets try somewhere else." Texas complains but Elgato glares at her and heads for the basement.  
Down the stairs and _holy shit_.  
At first it just looks like an ordinary basement; boring washing machine and basement _stuff_. But then you look for El, behind the stairs, and stare at the wall. There's a wall. A wall with guns. Not a small amount of guns. You didn't even know walls like this existed outside of movieland.  
"Jesus Christ, it's fricken Christmas and I have been _so_ good." Texas says with a hand over her mouth. "How the fuck did you know this was down here?"   
Elgato shrugs. "Just had a feeling, man."  
You frown at that, there's something defensive about the way he says it; but then you shrug. You think you're a pretty good judge of character; you're pretty sure if one them was to be worried about, it'd probably be Texas and she's only likely to run off, not actively take you down. You can live with that.  
"Dibs on the shotgun." You say as you pull it down from the wall; it's heavy and old, but looks like it's been kept well. "We got shells somewhere?"  
  
  
"You hear that?" Someone asks as you all seem to hear the noises at the same time. You duck low, crouching low as you move forward to see if you can get a look at the source of the noise. _Holy shit_ , you've missed how right this feels. It's been so long since you've held a gun, since you've stalked streets, since you've felt like an actual scary motherfucker.   
Maybe before all this you could've become something else, but now you only feel right with a gun in hand; prepared to do violence.  
  
You follow the fence; keeping low with your shoulder just brushing lightly against the tin. You probably should be freaking out about _someone_ being _here_ but for some reason the only thing you're thinking about is how grateful the fence you're hiding behind is made of tin and not one of those fancy see through iron ones; that'd make sneaking around a hell of a lot harder.   
"Is it them?" Elgato asks as he crouches beside you.   
You think about it; you've been feeling uneasy ever since someone asked _you hear that?_  
"Postals." You say as you start inching up upwards trying to figure out the best was to get a look without them seeing you. You don't even try to make it sound like you're guessing if they're Postals or not. They simply just are. You figure if El or Maria want to find out for sure they can check themselves, but you don't need to see and Postal like actions to confirm what you know.   
It feels good to rely on your instincts, to actually trust yourself for once. You could get used to that feeling.   
Now you just want to see how many of them are out there; you're almost considering just sticking your head out around the corner and take a gawk at them like that - it's so frustrating trying to see without being seen. You only want to know how many there are - how well armed they are - mostly out of curiosity; though a small part of your brain is reminding you that you have a gun again now, and _doesn't that just even the playing field_?  
You stretch slowly upwards, craning your neck to the side so the top of your head isn't visible to the Postals on the other side of the fence. Finally you can see them and - _holy fucking shit_ \- you duck back down.  
"It's an army." You say breathlessly, you've never seen so many Postals in one place.  
"Shit, are they looking for us?" El asks, looking at you like you're somehow you're gonna divine the answer. Maybe you kind of can, but relying on a feeling to judge whether or not you should announce your presence to someone is completely different to gauging intent. You don't think your new found confidence is ready to give a definite answer on this.  
"I don't think they are. They wouldn't use an army just to look for us," You pause. "Would they?"  
"Others." Maria says and Elgato nods.  
"Yeah, maybe they're after the guys that attacked the prison."  
That's probably what they're doing, you hope. Although it won't be a particularly comforting thought; if they're looking for someone else but find you in the process, the end result will still be the same. The thought obviously occurs to the others as well because Elgato starts muttering Spanish curses under his breath and Maria looks like she's about to join him.  
"It's okay," You say in your most reassuring voice. "We lay low, keep quiet, they'll just pass right by us."  
  
You go to stand - to see if you can see which way they're heading out of town - but you feel a light prodding on your shoulder; pushing you down. You grab Elgato's wrist as he goes to do the same thing. He looks at you, surprised at the contact and you wonder just how distant you must be to get that level of surprise just by touching someone.  
' _Wait_ ,' you mouth, even though you're not sure what you're supposed to be waiting for. Out of the corner of your eye you try to see if anything is actually on your shoulder. It's been a long time since you felt a shadow's hand on you; you guess that now you're free and armed again, you have your uses again. And doesn't that thought just open up a whole lotta new questions? You know you're probably just gonna have to resign yourself to never really knowing what the fuck is up with the shadows. Hell, you're still not even entirely convinced that it isn't your own sub-concious fucking around with you.  
"What are we waiting for?" Elgato whispers.  
"Just wait." You answer, relying on the pressure that you can feel on your shoulder to tell you when it's okay to stand up. Elgato gives an exasperated sigh but listens to you.  
Nothing happens.  
You begin to wonder if you're somehow imagining the pressure.  
Then - not more than a few minutes after the last Postal troop is out of sight - a group of three Postals come down the street.  
"What the fuck?" Elgato mutters. "What? They like some sort of fucking backwards scouts or something?"  
You shrug; you don't know, but it kind of makes sense, catching anyone who thinks the army has passed by. Hell, they would've caught you if not for your Crazy. You all watch them for past with held breath. You can't help but think it would really suck if you can go by unnoticed by an entire army only to get caught by a few Postals straight after.  
After they've left you're all keen to move on. The idea of remaining here, after all the Postals that just marched through, seems like a bad idea and more than a little fucking stupid.   
  
It's surprising as hell, finding people out here. It's more surprising that they're making a shitload of noise, and don't seem to even trying to hide. You didn't think there'd be any people left out here, let alone doing whatever it is they're doing.   
"Are they?" Elgato asks, looking at you for confirmation.  
"No." You whisper, they're definitely not Postals.   
"Is he?" He nods at the man between the two guys.   
"No."   
"What the fuck? Are they doing what I think they're doing?" Elgato frowns at the trio and you nod.   
"Looks like it."  
"What the fuck?" Elgato repeats and you don't even know. You can just about make out the words - the racial slurs and cursing - that the two guys are spitting the face of the third, tied up between them. From what they're saying, it sounds like they've decided to blame everything on him. You think it's a bit harsh to blame a global pandemic on a single ethnicity.  
"Wankers." Maria says with a glare and you smile at her; when she's right, she is very right.  
"How good of a shot are you with that?" You ask nodding at Elgato's rifle.  
"Oh you aren't serious." Texas groans loudly. She looks pretty bad now, you have no idea where she finds the energy to keep moving, let alone complain. Elgato ignores her.  
"I'm all right."  
"What are your chances of missing the guy?"  
"Pretty good."  
"Okay," You say, checking your shotgun. "Don't shoot unless you're sure."  
"What are you doing?" Texas asks.  
"I'm going to go and see if I can get closer."  
"Of course you are." Texas flops back down on the ground and mutters. "I give up, you're all idiots."  
"Shoot when I give you the nod." You say as he nods and lines his rifle up.  
"All right, go."  
It's frustrating trying to be quiet and sneaky when all you want to do is rush our and make them stop hurting the guy. The idea that he'll get killed before you get into a good position sits heavily in the forefront of your mind; but if you screw this up everyone dies and that's even more of an unacceptable outcome.   
Finally you get close enough to say that if you had to shoot, you could do it safely, without hitting the innocent guy. You look across and meet El's eye, then give him a nod.  
The first guy goes down as the sound of a gunshot cracks through the air.  
The remaining guy panics; pulling his trussed up victim in front of him, trying to look everywhere and wildly waving his gun around.  
"We just want the guy." You say as you come out into his line of sight. "We'll let you go, we just want him."  
"Yeah," He snarls. "Like I'm going to trust you or your spic boyfriend."   
He's yelling and starts waving his gun in Elgato's direction.  
"Yeah I see him hiding over there. Get him to come out."  
"He isn't my boyfriend." You say, shrugging and wondering how this is going to end. You're not worried, for some reason you feel very calm about the whole situation.   
"I don't even know if he is hispanic. Is it the same as latino?" You ask as Elgato reveals himself, rifle held steadily in his hands; you genuinely want to know. "Are they mutually exclusive?"  
"Is this really the time?" El sounds exasperated.  
"It seems like a good time to ask." You answer flippantly. "It's not like comes up in conversation very often. And you can’t just ask people shit like that out of the blue, you know."  
It might seem like a silly time to be babbling about this, but it's not like there’s much else to do; you can't shoot while he's holding the guy like he is and you're pretty sure if Elgato could, he'd have done shot by now.  
"Can we get back on topic here?" Elgato growls.  
"Yeah" The guy agrees and you giggle a bit at how weird this is getting.  
"Well, what's it going to take to get you to let the guy go?" You ask.  
"You put your guns down," He sounds desperate, that's probably a bad sign. "Put them down and I'll let you have him."  
"That implies a lot of trust, china." You say, rolling your eyes.  
"China? What the fuck?" He says, voice pitching high and, _shit_ , someday you're going to actually watch watch you're saying to gun wielding racists. "I ain't no fucking chink."  
"Sorry, dude." You say with a sigh. "It's slang, keeps fucking slipping out at shitty times."  
"Slang? Slang for fucking what? Where the fuck are you from anyway?"  
"Mate. It's rhyming slang for 'mate'." You feel like it's probably in your best interests to keep him talking. "I'm from Jo'burg, South Africa. You ever been there?"  
"To _Africa_? Why the fuck would I go to Africa?"  
"Just making conversation." You shrug. "Trying to be nice so that maybe I won't have to shoot you in the face with this shotgun here."  
"Jesus, fuck, _Mujer_." Elgato swears at you. "Can you _not_ antagonize the crazy bastard with the gun?"  
"Dude, he's a crazy racist fuck with a gun, surrounded by a fucking Puerto Rican and a black chick. I'm pretty sure the only way we can antagonize him more is to start insulting his mother." You look at him, there's someone moving behind him. "You know any good 'yo mamas so fat' jokes?"  
"Hey bitch!" He yells, shoving at his human shield and pointing his gun at you.   
Then his head explodes to the beautiful boom of a forty five. He falls to the ground almost soundlessly and Maria appears from behind him.  
"Bam." She says and starts untying the guy.  
"Who are you guys?" He ask and you think if you could always hear that tone of awe you could probably feel good about yourself forever.  
"Prison escapees." Texas says, finally coming out from the bushes. "Saving the world, one hapless fuck at a time."  
"You are such a ray of fucking sunshine." Elgato snaps at her and she just curls her lip in disgust at him.  
"You okay?" You ask him, since everyone else seems to be happy bickering at each other, he doesn't seem too permanently hurt, just beat up.  
"Yeah." He says breathlessly, like he can't believe what’s happening. "Holy shit, those guys were going to kill me."  
"Non sai che gli asiatici hanno causato tutto." Maria says, eyes rolling mouth twisting into a scowl.  
"I don't speak whatever it is she's speaking." He says.  
"Don't worry, none of us do." Texas says waving her hand around. "We just smile and nod and hope she shuts the fuck up."  
" _Vaffanculo_!" Maria swears back, and _that_ you understood.  
"What's your name kid?" El asks.  
"Tony." He scrubs his hands through his hair. "Shit, fuck, man this is so heavy."  
You didn't know anyone not in the eighties still used the term 'heavy'.  
  


Tony says there's people nearby, a proper camp not much further. But in the end they find you.  
"Hey." A voice calls out and you all spin to look at the speaker. He's a tall, very tall man, and he's smiling at you.

Your guns up even as Elgato looks at you and you shake your head, he isn't one of _them_.  
"Who are you?" He asks, his voice full of alpha male and don't fuck with me.  
Behind him there's more people - _people_ \- and as you look at their faces, you recognize some of them.  
"You're the ones that broke into prison." You blurt out.  
"Yeah we are." He says with a grin. "Looks like you saw that first hand."   
He's looking at your white Orderly Jackets with it's Girl E name tag. You and Texas kept your jackets, you don't know what her reasons were, but yours sit somewhere between sentimentality and keeping a reminder.  
"Where are you from?" Elgato asks and Texas speaks up after with.  
"Who are you with?"  
"We're from across the border." He says and you can't help but think _about fucking time_. "We're Uniteds."  
They take you into their group. _That_ gives you a weird feeling of deja vu; you know it's silly because the circumstances are completely different. This isn't some ragtag group of people attempting something for the first time; this is a team of people who look like they do this on a regular basis. Still it makes you nervous, and from the shifty looks Texas keeps giving everyone, she feels the same.  
You try talking to her, but she just shrugs off anything you say and eventually you leave it.  
  
Texas leaves without telling anyone. Just a ' _hey, hold my jacket will ya?_ ' and then a moment later it's like she was never there. They look for her but no one finds so much as a trace of her. Wherever she's gone, she doesn't to be followed or found. The tall man apologises to you, tells you that they have to move on and apologises again like he feels personally responsible for losing her. But it's not his fault, you're not stupid, you know how badly she was hurt and you know how much she didn't trust people. It's not a big stretch of reasoning to presume that she'd not want to die in the company of strangers. You get it, but as you follow the departing group - hugging her jacket to your chest - you wonder if you could've done anything differently.


	6. Civvie Corp Rap (angry, hurt & bucking the system) awkward love story the last part by falloutboy

He's tall, perhaps the tallest person you've ever met. And he's following you around like he's decided you're someone interesting.  
You put it down to the fact that you seem to be the leader of your group, like maybe his interest because of that.  
It doesn't take much watching and listening to realise that they aren't so much of a rescue team as something entirely else.  
"This crossing the border thing, you're not doing this to save people are you?" You ask seriously. He looks away and you figure he won't answer you. But he does, with a quiet _no_. Then he looks back at you.  
"The only reason they let us out here is on the vague hope that we'll be able to recruit more people for the United cause. We're fighting all out wars with both the Feds and the Allies. Anytime now the Canadians could decide to come south, we're bordered with the Postals for at least two hundred and fifty miles and we can't keep them from crossing over." His voice gets defensive. "And don't think we're the only ones doing it. I know for a fucking fact that the Feds have their own Charlies and I'd bet anything that the Allies have something like us."  
You nod thoughtfully, you're still not sure what half of what he says actually means but you accept his answer.   
  
The first time you see Texas you know for a fact that she's not actually there; just like you've always known that you're the only one seeing those shadows, you _know_ no one else can see her. So you ignore her. You're good at that.  
The first time she talks to you, you figure you've officially transitioned from a little off centre to completely cracked. _Mazel tov!_ You can't even bring yourself to worry that much about it. It's not like seeing shit that isn't there is the worst thing you'll see today. Even if some days you feel like you should spend the rest of eternity shaking a magic eight ball, muttering _am I insane?_ Just waiting for _signs point to YES_ to pop up so you can use it as an excuse to lie down and _stop_.  
  
You never see which one of them notices you favouring your shoulder, but before you know it one of them is pestering you to let them look at it.   
"It's fine. It's healing. Stop touching me." You say quietly, moving away sharply at the touch.   
Eventually you give in and let them see it, just so they'll stop pestering you. All they do is confirm what you already know. _It's sore, but it's healing. Time is all it needs._   
Thank you for telling me for what I already know, you think sarcastically, rolling your eyes as you button your shirt back up.  
Then his hand brushes over your tattoo.   
"This new?" He asks in a low tone, like he's afraid he'll be overheard.   
You look at him - giving him a flat, unfriendly glare - then shrug off his hand and finish doing up your shirt. He looks at you, pensive and intrigued, and you walk away.  
Later you see him talking to the tall guy; from the way he's gesturing, it's fairly obvious that he's describing what he saw. The tall guy looks straight at you and you look down. Shit. Fuck.  
"Hey, what's going on?" Elgato asks and you think how weird it is to have his concerned look directed at you. "Hey, _Mujer_ , you okay?"  
"Tallguy likes you." Texas cuts in, the dirtiest grin on her face.  
"What?" Because really, where does she come up with this shit?  
"Tallguy. Why do you think he's always staring at you?"  
"He's been staring at me?" Really, since when? Surely you would've noticed. "Why would he even? _What_?" You seem to lose the ability to form proper sentences when faced with improbable logic.  
"Perhaps he likes your thousand yard stare." Texas grins hard and mean.  
You duck your head and stare at the ground, you don't have no goddamned thousand yard stare.  
" _Muj_?" Elgato asks again, worry in his voice. "You okay?"   
Sometimes you think the movies have seriously understated how fucking annoying it is to go crazy. Hi-jinks do not ensue, instead you spend all your time trying to not talk out aloud to a dead girl or mention that the bruises on your face are from a fucking shadow.  
  
He's watching you. Been staring at you since they checked the hole in your shoulder. Why they bothered, you don't know, it's mostly healed now.  
"What?" You ask quietly but fiercely, snarling through clenched teeth. "What are you staring at? You never seen a tattoo before?"  
Him staring at you makes you nervous, like somehow he's looking at you and seeing stacks of bodies and ash falling like rain.  
"Seen plenty of them when I was on scavenger detail." He answers, ducking his head and finally not staring at her. "Never seen one of them on a live one before."  
And then you _know_ that he knows exactly what those numbers and squiggles mean.  
You say nothing but he must notice how you're watching Maria and Elgato, making sure they're not following the conversation, because he stops asking questions, walks off and you foolishly think that maybe that's that. But he comes back, later when everyone's wandered away and you're alone.  
"How'd you get out?" He asks quietly.  
You stare at the gun in your hands and don't say anything. Part of you wants to tell him, wants to tell someone and maybe just _share_.  
"So you're from Philly." You counter, hoping the awkward personal - _how's your home, the bomb crater, going these days?_ \- question will make him shut up and leave you alone. But he has a bigger bang in his arsenal.  
"Can you really tell a Postal just by looking at them?"  
Okay, you didn't expect that. You wonder who could've told him that. You don't think Maria would've. Elgato might, but he wouldn't if Maria didn't want him to. Maybe one of the group from the prison, but you didn't any of them had noticed that little habit of yours.  
"Don't be silly," You scoff; denial, denial, denial is the codeword of today. "No one can do that."  
"Sure be handy though, wouldn't it?" He sticks his hands in his pockets and you get the distinct feeling that he doesn't believe you. "This shits hard enough without worrying if the guys you're letting cross the border are actually Postal spies. Isn't it weird that they don't look any different from us?"  
He trying to get you to talk, and maybe spill some secrets. You can deal with that.  
"A guy I knew once said it was like we'd been invaded by our loved ones - or at least people who looked like them - and we'd never be able to tell if they wanted to hug us or put our heads on sticks."  
He tilts his head to the side, studying you, and you carefully keep your blank expression.  
"That's a good one, I'll have to remember that next time the boss' start bitching about Postals sneaking through checkpoints. Don't know what they expect us to do, can't just open fire on anyone who looks shifty."  
"Well you can," You say with a small smile. "You just can't win hearts and minds like that."  
He laughs.  
"No, people start getting all upset when you start slaughtering survivors."  
You wonder about that - _winning hearts and minds_ \- the idea that one day people are just going to accept the Postals claim in the land they hold, and then turn their attention to bickering amongst themselves over who gets what.  
"Do you think the treaty will hold?"  
"You know this is the most I've heard you talk since we picked you guys up?" You look away shifting uncomfortably as he looks at you, then he switches back to the question you asked. "Treaty might hold. The United's army can't take on the Postals face to face. Not while they're fending of Feds and Allies. Pretty soon the only people getting any Postal action are gonna be Charlies."  
"Charlies?" You ask. You've heard the term bandied around since you fell in with these guys, but you've yet to hear a proper explanation.   
"Yeah, it's that whole army alphabet thing, you know, alpha, bravo, charlie? Since we're the Civilian Corp, unofficially we're Charlie Charlie. It's supposed to be an insult, kind of a throwback from Vietnam,with like the Vietcong and shit? Because we've got no proper training, or discipline. The army guys are big on discipline. But I say fuck it, we're fucking enthusiastic, and those sons of bitches fought against the great American war machine and in the end they were still standing."  
He sounds to prideful and a little bit defensive that you wonder how many times you have to hear an insult before you decide to say _fuck you_ and embrace it.   
"You know, they got slaughtered a lot right?"   
"Hey, I'm not saying it's a perfect term." He laughs. "And being a Charlie isn't the greatest career opportunity. But the alternative is sitting in the Civvie City, subsisting on handouts and hoping the guys in charge don't royally screw everything up."   
And that's maybe the crux of the situation, because you don't know what you're going to do when you cross into United territory.

  
The Uniteds take your weapons, then take your clothes and burn them. You kind of get why, but still, it's the third time you've been stripped and marched to a shower - admittedly this one is a lot nicer than the prisons - and you're fucking sick of it. It's bad enough that you'll be relying on these guys for everything from food to protection, but now you don't even own the clothes on your back. You don't say anything though; don't want to rock the boat. At least, not until you know how far the boat can be rocked.  
  
To be honest, the reason you're going to join up has less to do with revenge and more to do with not living in those temporary civilian placement shacks. They're depressing, overcrowded and remind you all too much of the camp.  
That and there's this air of hopelessness that fills the camps. Not just the civvies, but even the military personnel look like they've given up on ever being able to do anything about the Postals. Hell they don't even seem that optimistic about taking on the Feds or Allies. You almost wonder if you should be skipping sides, because _goddamn_ surely someone with power feels like you do.  
When you crossed over the border, the men dressed in army uniforms wouldn't even cross the line to help you all across.   
"They're not allowed too," Tallguy says. "We stay on our side, Postals stay on theirs and we all get along _amicably_ "  
"So that's it?" You ask bitterly. "You're just letting them live free, letting them continue doing what doing over there?"   
You just can't believe people would sit by while there were places like those fucking prisons and camps in their country.  
"It's the rules. There's treaties and signed deals being made." He smiles, slyly amused. "The _army_ can't cross, and the _government_ can't condone any crossing over."  
Oh. _Oh_ , so it's like that. You could get used to this political pussy footing around.  
"So what group did you say you were apart of?"  
"Civilian Corp. Officially we run supplies for soldiers."  
"And unofficially?"   
His answering grin is so sharp it looks like it could cut.  
"Unofficially we kill Postals in their beds." His words should sound like false bravado, but there’s an underlying hardness that says plainly _this is what I do, this is what I am good at._ "You should join up."  
"Me?"  
"Yeah, why not? If there's even a little bit of truth to that rumour, you'd be handy as all hell. And even if it's all bullshit," He pauses, leaning over and pressing his closed fist gently against your chest above your tattoo, just high enough to be decent. "You look like someone that's good at surviving.  
He picks up you hand and holds it, pressed between his palms. He looks at you, searching for the one emotion you're not sure your capable of anymore. Whatever he wants to believe you're thinking, you're pretty sure its not the _thank god he left you with a hand free_ that you actually are thinking.  
He leans in and you startle.  
"What are you doing?"  
"..I thought I was going to kiss you." He looks at you - awkwardly leaning towards you - and you stare at him. "Or not."  
"We are just going to sit here." You say waving a finger under his nose. "Sit here and enjoy the for fucking once peace and quiet."  
Surprisingly, he does, just sits beside you like you asked. You wonder why he seems to like you so much. You think about asking, but then you'd have to hear the answer and you're not sure you're ready to hear whatever he thinks about you.  
  
Being around so many people is unsettling. Some days someone will say something that reminds of home, but it'll be only half remembered, like a really vivid dream, fading upon waking. Sometimes you can't remember if your mother was a teacher, or if it was your dad. If you really think about it, sometimes you can piece together enough memories to remind yourself that your dad was the teacher and your mum was a nurse. You never thought you'd forget things like that. It makes you worry about the important memories, like what your parents' faces look like, or the way your father laughed tossing his head back with a wide open mouth or the way your mother used to take you off to the jetty when she had an evening off. You think it would be fucking terrible if you ever forget those things.  
  
"Do you understand what you're volunteering for?" The man in his pristine army uniform asks you and you stare at him. _Is he fucking serious?_ Of course you fucking know what you're volunteering for, you feel like yelling, you've got a tattoo forced into the skin above your heart that says you're past your use by date. But instead you just give a sharp nod.  
  
Your new uniform is just a button down shirt over a tank top and cargo pants. You get to accessorize with a lever action rifle, that looks like John Wayne might've used back in the day, and a double barrel shotgun. It's a nice enough gun, but it does make you miss the pump action you had back in New York. At least with that one you didn't have to reload half as often. But still, it's better than nothing, you guess, and in the land of little what you got is plenty. You top off the look with a long, wicked looking, knife - just like you promised yourself - and small flick knife; just in case. Of course, if it comes down to using that you don't hold a lot of hope for your survival, but it's still something, still gives you a chance.  
  
It's like you're now apart of a secret club; like there’s a non-existent secret handshake and mark that singles you out as a Charlie. The singling out, the attention - the suspicious, wary attention - that Charlies get, all of that should make your skin crawl and have you running in the opposite direction. But instead you feel something that could be pride - a tiny ember in your chest - and you think just this fucking once, being marked is not such a bad thing. Hell, it might end up being your life's purpose.  
  
The military personnel look at your Charlie badge like it's a symbol of evil or anarchy. They've been known to harass lone Charlies, but you don't really have that problem. You're the girl with a death camp tattoo and an uncanny knack of knowing when trouble's coming; it's like everything you've been through since all this begun means you've reached and fallen into a whole 'nother category of unfathomable.   
  
They keep telling you that you'll be fighting a lost war, that you'll never be welcomed on the streets and that it's very likely you'll be considered a criminal. But really, what else are you going to do?


End file.
